By intertwining today’s issues of homelessness, missing and murdered Indigenous women and the overdose crisis, Bah Humbug! – a spin on Charles Dickens’ iconic A Christmas Carol – takes the western European classic and makes it relevant to Vancouver.
Co-produced by SFU Woodward’s Cultural Programs and Vancouver Moving Theatre, in partnership with Full Circle: First Nations Performance, the play takes to the stage at SFU’s Goldcorp Centre for the Arts from Dec. 7-16. After seven years under the direction of Max Reimer, this year James Fagan Tait directs the re-invigorated Christmas production.
Tait, a Jesse award-winning playwright, with previous experience producing shows in the Downtown Eastside, says he was inspired to take on the mantle of directing Bah Humbug! after attending the play last year.
“I was blown away by the connection with the community and how the audience actually claimed it as their own,” says Tait. “The audiences are territorial about it; they’re like, ‘This is our show, this is about us and the people on stage, we know them now.’”
Jenifer Brousseau, a Vancouver-based Indigenous actor, who, among other roles in the show, plays Scrooge’s ex-fiancée, Belle, as well as the Raven, says the adaptation begins with a ceremony.
“There’s a really strong Indigenous component to it, which is really beautiful,” she says. “It opens with honouring and speaking of the four directions, and pulling everybody in the space. And the Raven represents that spirit, the spirit that Scrooge communicates with. The raven is the spirit of the show, the trickster.”
In Bah Humbug!, Scrooge is played by renowned blues musician Jim Byrnes, who, in the story, owns several Downtown Eastside SROs and a pawn shop. Of course, the money-hungry, cold-hearted character remains true to Charles Dickens’ original intent.
“It’s similar to AChristmas Carolin that it’s about a transformation of a broken person, who, through a number of challenges and events that show up in his life one night, change him,” says Brousseau. “But [in Bah Humbug!] we bring out a lot of true stories from this [East Vancouver] neighbourhood.”
That audience members – many of whom live, work or spend time in the Downtown Eastside – can identify with story lines in the show is crucial to the experience of theatre. “Identification is critical…,” says Tait. “If you do connect with it [the theatre], then you have a chance at changing your life, or at least taking a breath from your life, to go, ‘Wait a minute, what’s going on? Am I the person I want to be, am I connecting to people the way I want to be?’”
• Bah Humbug runs from Dec. 7-16, at various times, at the SFU Goldcorp Centre for the Arts (149 W. Hastings St.) Tickets $20-$35.
