REVIEW: Cripple Creek troupe finds new ways to mine 'Christmas Carol'

GRADE: B

CRIPPLE CREEK • “A Christmas Carol” is that most dreaded of holiday offerings: a show people make a point to see year after year—whether they really want to or not. So it’s a relief when a theater company freshens it up by putting their own spirited spin on the tale.

That’s what you’ll get from Thin Air Theatre Company’s “A Cripple Creek Christmas Carol.” Here, Ebenezer Scrooge becomes a miserly mine owner named Zachariah Gooch, Bob Cratchit becomes a widower with a lame little girl, and the ghosts are combined into the ghost of Bob Womack, the prospector who first discovered gold near Cripple Creek in 1890.

The show is different enough from the Dickens classic to seem brand new, but familiar enough to give you the same warm fuzzies. And it throws in loads of local “in” gags to boot.

Mel Moser has stolen the show so many times at the Butte Opera House he should be arrested. This time is no exception. As Gooch, he’s amusingly mean at the beginning (his song “Christmas is for Suckers” is a hoot) but shows a touching and very credible transformation at the end.

Other standouts are Chris Armbrister (who also wrote the play) as a wacky Womack and Thin Air newcomer Rob Scharlow as the young Gooch’s jovial boss.

My only gripes are that the story is a little slow — it takes over an hour for the ghost to appear — and the ending wraps things up way too neatly.

The play is followed by a 25-minute olio in which Santa’s elves are forced to sell off all the Big Man’s goods and end up singing Christmas parodies like “I’m Dreaming of a White Trash Christmas.” Even the Balloon Boy makes an appearance (albeit in gray-haired form). I thought it was painfully cheesy, but the sellout crowd loved it.

 Chances are you will too, as long as you’re not a Zachariah Gooch.

“A Cripple Creek Christmas Carol”

By Thin Air Theatre Company

When: 7 p.m. Thursdays-Saturdays, 1 p.m. Saturdays-Sundays through Dec. 31

Where: The Butte Theater, 139 Bennett Ave. Cripple Creek

Tickets: $7.75-$12.75; butteoperahouse.com or 689-3247