Trinity Rep Announces 46th Annual A CHRISTMAS CAROL

Trinity Repertory Company returns to live performances with its 46th annual holiday production of A Christmas Carol. Noted for being a new production each year, the 2022 production will be directed by Aileen Wen McGroddy, a recent graduate of the Brown/Trinity Rep MFA Program in Directing, and features longtime company member Phyllis Kay as Ebenezer Scrooge. A Christmas Carol runs in the Chace Theater from November 3, 2022 through January 1, 2023 with press opening night on Wednesday, November 9, at 7:30 pm. Tickets start at $27 and are available online at trinityrep.com/carol or by contacting the ticket office at (401) 351-4242.  

"I am particularly excited to have Aileen at the helm of A Christmas Carol this year," Trinity Rep Artistic Director Curt Columbus said. "Her work is always filled with music, joy, and wonder, which makes her perfectly suited to deliver a beautiful holiday present to audiences with this story. I'm also beyond thrilled to have Phyllis Kay in the role of Scrooge in our production. Phyllis is one of the great treasures of the Trinity Rep acting company. Her brilliant sense of humor and her incredible heart will make this a Carol for the ages."

Founding Artistic Director Adrian Hall first added A Christmas Carol to Trinity Rep's lineup in 1977, just four years after moving into the company's current home at the Lederer Theater Center on Washington Street. Since then, the production has become a holiday tradition for generations of families in Southern New England. Trinity Rep's production is set apart from other holiday productions by the fact that it is reimagined every year by a new director, cast, and set of designers in order to be relevant and timely for contemporary audiences. Nearly two million people have seen the show since its inception more than four decades ago.

Aileen Wen McGroddy is a Chinese-Irish-American theater director, educator, and producer of live events. Her work is imaginative, inclusive, and playfully experimental, coming from a robust background in physical theatre and a deep commitment to hospitality. She became a person in New York, a theater-maker in Chicago, and graduated with an MFA in Directing from Brown/Trinity Rep in 2022, where she directed the fall 2021 production of The Late Wedding. Aileen is a 2050 Fellow at New York Theatre Workshop and the BOLD Resident Director at Northern Stage.

"In this year's production of A Christmas Carol, I'm exploring what makes people return to this story each holiday season," Aileen said. Dickens's London is rife with inequality, plagued by greed, and harshly unforgiving to those struggling to survive. A world like that creates a person like Ebenezer Scrooge, who lives the values that this environment taught her: She moves through the world armored, heart bolted tight with grief and fear. While Scrooge is an extreme case, I think we all protect ourselves from the discomforts and vulnerabilities of living in an unequal society. This story asks us to consider what we might gain if we were to fully open ourselves to the people we share the world with - to meet their needs, to listen to their words, to appreciate their gifts, and to let ourselves be seen."

Aileen will work alongside choreographer Shura Baryshnikov, music director Andrew Smithson, set designer Tatiana Kahvegian, costume designer Camilla Dely, lighting designer Keith Parham, and sound designer Caroline Eng.

Phyllis Kay joined Trinity Rep's resident artistic company in 1991 and has appeared in 13 other productions of A Christmas Carol in an assortment of roles. This year's production will be her first time portraying Scrooge. This is also the first time since 2003 that a woman has been cast in the role at Trinity Rep.

Joining Phyllis on stage are fellow company members Angela Brazil and Rachael Warren; Brown/Trinity Rep MFA students Michael Hisamoto '23, Claire Koenig '23, Jenny Nguyen Nelson '23, and Luis Ra Rivera '23; Brown/Trinity Rep alumni Jihan Haddad '22 and Gunnar Manchester '22; and guest performers Jeff Ararat, Jenna Lea Scott, and Dereks Thomas. The production will also feature a children's cast comprised of 12 young local actors including: Jianni Amaral (Cranston, RI), Eleanor Brown-Araujo (Cranston, RI), Malik Cross (Providence, RI), Deyehla Debrito-Zuendoki (Attleboro, MA), Charlotte Hall (Easton, MA), Emily Mallon (Seekonk, MA), Samuel Memery (Cranston, RI), Cameron Miller (Pawcatuck, CT), Kiera Nagle (Pawtucket, RI), Owen Richard (Ledyard, CT), Victoria Ruiz (Cranston, RI), and Giselle Vides (Providence, RI).

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