A CHRISTMAS CAROL   Role: Young Ebenezer, Ensemble   Production Info: 12/15-30, 2006 @ Gateway Playhouse (NY) Director: Bob Durkin Choreographer: John Dietrich Musical Director: Nathan Perry

Ever since I've know her, My good friend Melissa Giattino has often sung the praises of the Gateway Playhouse, a regional theatre near her home in eastern Long Island, NY.  Well, during December 2006, I got to spread holiday cheer to her and her family by playing the role of "Young Ebenezer" in A Christmas Carol: The Musical, the Long Island premiere of Madison Square Garden’s annual production. Presented at the historic Patchogue Theatre,  this wonderful holiday spectacular ushered in the spirit of Christmas with rich costumes, special effects, a live orchestra and a handful of adorably talented kids.  I may not have gotten to spend Christmas 2006 with my own family in Florida, but at least I had the next best thing...courtesy of the wonderful Giattino family (thanks for the amazing home cooking, Diane!) Click on this link to visit the Gateway Playhouse website.

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NEWSDAY, 12/20/2006 by Steve Parks For 10 years beginning in 1994, 2.5 million people celebrated the holidays by attending a lavish musical adaptation of "A Christmas Carol" at the cavernous Theater at Madison Square Garden. Celebrity Scrooges from Tony Randall to Roger Daltry impersonated fiction's famous skinflint against a sprawling Victorian set by Tony Walton, wailing their humbugs to an upbeat score by "Beauty and the Beast" composer Alan Menken. This season, as MSG has adopted "Annie," the chorus-line version of "A Christmas Carol" makes its Long Island premiere at Patchogue's ornate former vaudeville house. As produced by Gateway Playhouse's Paul Allan and directed by Bob Durkin, this "Carol" eschews many of the Vegas aspects of the gaudy original. Choreographer John Dietrich tones down the Halloween ghoulishness of Jacob Marley's "Link by Link" dance number, though Howard Pinhasik as Marley directs a fellow ghost offstage, head in hand. Rather than beat their chains percussively against the floor, the living dead jingle them like sleigh bells.... As the bewigged and wigged-out Fezziwigs, the hosts of young Scrooge and Marley's apprenticeship, Robert Anthony Jones and Debra Cardona make merry to a rollicking song that highlights John Shuman's sardonic Ghost of Christmas Past tour. Christopher Sapienza as the Ghost of Christmas Present stands resplendent in his ermine and holly robe chiding Scrooge for his blindness to opportunities that might still be his this Christmas morn. They drop in unseen on the miser's underpaid clerk Bob Cratchit (Kip Driver) and Scrooge's lone family connection, nephew Fred (Caleb Damschroder). ...Tiny Tim's "God bless us everyone" message - delivered by a sweet and tear-inducing Ryan Meenan - ...endures.