Robert Bathurst stars as 'Scrooge' in Dolly Parton's Smoky Mountain Christmas Carol

Producers Fiery Angel Entertainment and Red Tail Entertainment are delighted to announce casting for the European Premiere of Dolly Parton’s Smoky Mountain Christmas Carol – A New Musical at the Southbank Centre’s Queen Elizabeth Hall from 8 December 2022 to 8 January 2023, with a press night on 13 December 2022. Extra performances have been added on 22 and 29 December due to popular demand.www.dollyschristmascarol.com

‘Cold Feet’ and ‘Toast of London’ star Robert Bathurst will lead the cast as Scrooge. He is joined by Halle Brown, Iona Fraser, Richard J Hunt, Vicki Lee Taylor, Olivier Award winner George Maguire, Ediz Mahmut, Sarah O’Connor, Christopher Parkinson, Minal Patel, Annie Southall, Carole Stennett, Danny Whitehead and Mitchell Zhangazha. Playing the role of Tiny Tim will be Daniel Lee, Alexander Quinlan and Samuel Sturge. Also in the children’s cast will be Elliot Marsden, George Menezes Cutts and Dereke Oladele.

Robert Bathurst is a TV and stage actor best known for Cold Feet, Toast Of London, Joking Apart and Downton Abbey. He played John Le Mesurier in the biopic Hattie and Sergeant Wilson in Dad’s Army - The Lost Episodes. Numerous West End and touring theatre productions include plays by Chekhov, Shaw, Shakespeare, Wilde, Ibsen, Michael Frayn, Joe Penhall, Steven Thompson, Michael Wynne and Claire Luckham. In Chicago he played the title role in King Charles III by Mike Bartlett. With the ex-professional jockey Nathan Horrocks he wrote and directed The Fall, a film drama about jockeys. He devised and produces the staging of Love, Loss & Chianti by Christopher Reid a two-actor play in verse with cartoon animation. He has written articles and book reviews on showbiz and horseracing and as a reader of audiobooks he won the Audie for Best Male Narrator in 2020.

Set during the 1930s in the Smoky Mountains of East Tennessee, this heart-warming and truly unforgettable production imagines Ebenezer Scrooge as the owner of a mining company town, where his callous greed blinds him to the joys and gifts of the season. As a Christmas Eve snowstorm approaches, Scrooge is visited by the spirit of his deceased business partner and three ghosts who compel him to see life anew and discover that love and family are the greatest and most precious gifts we have. Dickens’ classic characters and Parton’s heart-felt songs beautifully reimagine this timeless story in a whole new light.

Dolly Parton’s Smoky Mountain Christmas Carol is an adaptation by David H. Bell, Paul T. Couch and Curt Wollan. The book is by David H. Bell with music and Lyrics by Dolly Parton. It is produced by Fiery Angel Entertainment and Red Tail Entertainment.

Dolly Parton’s Smoky Mountain Christmas Carol is directed and choreographed by Alison Pollard, with musical direction by Andrew Hilton. Set design is by Scott Davis, Costume design by Linda Roethke, Props design by Eleanor Kahn, Lighting design by David Howe and Sound design by Richard Brooker. The Assistant Director and Choreographer is Andrew Margerison, the Associate Musical Director is Leigh Stanford Thompson and the Associate Sound Designer is Kelsh Buckman Drudge. Casting is by Pearson Casting.

6th October 2022

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