Old Scrooge(1913)Scrooge(original title).Add Full Plot|Add SynopsisPlot Keywords:victorian era|redemption|compassion|ghost|based on novel| See more »... Synopsis Old Scrooge(1913)Scrooge(original title)
Movie Title: Old Scrooge(1913)Scrooge(original title)
Run Time: 40 min
Rating: 7.2 / 10
Genres: Short |Drama |Fantasy
Release Date: January 1914 (USA)
Director: Leedham Bantock
Writer: Charles Dickens ,Seymour Hicks... and other credits
Actor: Seymour Hicks,William Lugg,Leedham Bantock
Seymour Hicks, in a long and distinguished career, had a specialty of playing Scrooge on stage for many a decade. He first essayed the role in 1901, when barely past thirty and got bad reviews because he couldn't play 'old' well -- he got better at it. In his time, he committed the role to film twice: in this silent film (re-edited in the mid-twenties) and in a sound version in 1935.
In this earlier version he gives a fine performance, but it is quite clearly gauged for the stage. He twitches, he shakes himself out of camera range and he is the angriest Scrooge I have ever seen: not in the sense of ready to lose his temper, but angry all the time. It's an interesting interpretation and must have been a corker on stage. But on the theater screen it is, alas, just too big.
