Michael May's Blog, page 166

'You Wish to Be Anonymous?' | Michael Caine (1992)

Index of other entries in The Christmas Carol Project

I mentioned this last year, but The Muppet Christmas Carol is unique in that it has the charitable solicitors' visit overlap Fred's by a considerable margin. Other adaptations may have the two men come in as Fred's leaving, but here they get to interact quite a bit. As Fred's just finishing up his speech about how wonderful Christmas is, Gonzo cuts in to introduce the audience to the "well-meaning gentlemen (who) call upon businesses collecting for the poor and homeless." Cue Professor Honeydew and Beaker.

It's great casting since in Dickens the second gentleman remains silent for the entire scene anyway. Most adaptations correct this by sharing the dialogue between the two characters, but the Muppets don't have to since Beaker simply meeps behind Honeydew. Honeydew himself makes an interesting solicitor, but I'll come back to that in a second.

It's interesting that there's no confusion about whether Scrooge is Scrooge or Marley. In spite of Marley's name on the sign outside, Honeydew presumes he's Scrooge. Maybe he's done a little research and learned that the Marley brothers are dead?

Scrooge's reaction to them is interesting. His "Who are you?" is curt, but not offensive. If he thinks they're customers, he's not excited to take their money like Scrooge McDuck is, nor is he outright rude with them like Reginald Owen. He knows that they need something from him and he exerts that power right away in the relationship while still leaving the door open for them to do business. It fits with Michael Caine's portrayal so far of a Scrooge who has obtained his power and money through smarts and cleverness.

(Interesting, but meaningless side note: Honeydew gives Scrooge the name of the organization they're collecting for. It's the Order of Victoria Charity Foundation. )

Since Fred is still there, he has some more fun with his uncle by gleefully misrepresenting Scrooge to the solicitors as a generous man. That gets a growl from Scrooge, but he regains his humor for most of his conversation with Honeydew. That's similar to what we saw in the Alastair Sim cartoon and with Scrooge McDuck, but we've also already seen that humor in Caine's Scrooge in the first couple of scenes. Again, he's a smart, clever man and that means that he also has to be somewhat self-aware. When he says horrible things, it betrays the darkness of his heart, but he often does it with a chuckle, so he's at least attempting to disguise his wickedness as humor.

That only confuses Honeydew though, who on The Muppet Show traditionally also had a dark sense of humor in the way he let horrible things happen to Beaker during experiments. Even though Honeydew is playing a character here, he does it with his typical mannerisms and one of those is that his response to horrible things is sometimes laughter. Since Scrooge is also laughing at unpleasant things, Honeydew can't really tell if they're kindred spirits or not. He has a hard time figuring out if Scrooge is serious and the offer of anonymity is a result of that.

Scrooge gets serious with his, "I wish to be left alone," which leads into one of my favorite exchanges in the whole movie. Scrooge says that he doesn't make himself merry at Christmas, to which Fred replies, "That certainly is true." But then Scrooge follows it up with the traditional, "And I cannot afford to make idle people merry," to which Fred replies, "That is certainly not true."

This causes Scrooge to turn his attention back to Fred and finish up their conversation that we talked about last year. There's a nice, final moment between Fred and the solicitors though when Fred drops some coins into Beaker's hand and says that he's leaving Scrooge to make his donation.

Possibly because Fred has hinted that Scrooge will still donate, or possibly because Honeydew and Beaker are a little dense anyway, the solicitors stay at Scrooge's desk, patiently (and hilariously) waiting for his offering. That finishes his patience and we see him finally lose his temper on the way to the door to show them out. When he talks about the surplus population, he's shouting furiously.

Another unique aspect of this version is that the solicitors are equally frustrated. In most versions, they're saddened by Scrooge's attitude, but Honeydew is clearly flustered and Beaker actually scolds Scrooge on the way out. There's an emotional level in the parting that isn't reached in other versions (so far, anyway), so it's natural that Scrooge is still angry when he closes the door and sees the wreath that Fred left hanging on the knob. Scrooge picks it up and opens the door to throw the greenery at the solicitors (a la Scrooge McDuck), but what he finds on the other side... is something we'll wait until next year to discuss.

'You Wish to Be Anonymous?' | George C. Scott (1984)

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Yesterday I went on about how Scrooge McDuck is the most relatable Ebenezer Scrooge, completely forgetting that I'd already awarded George C. Scott that distinction last year. I should quit making it a contest, because each character is believable in different ways. The joy with which McDuck celebrates his wealth feels familiar and human, but it's an exaggerated, comical glee. The way Scott relates to his money is more subdued. He's a smart businessman and I get the feeling that he finds more pleasure in a shrewdly negotiated deal than in wealth for its own sake. That becomes really apparent in a scene that the '84 Christmas Carol adds to Dickens' text.

This version moves the charitable solicitors to a little later in the story and by the time we get there, Scrooge has become less sympathetic than he was in the first two scenes where he seemed put upon by Bob Cratchit and Fred. We'll cover Scrooge and Cratchit's time-off negotiation in detail next year, but Scrooge makes some good (if entirely selfish) points about paying for work that's not done. As I'm still sort of reluctantly nodding my head at that though, Scrooge has a couple of moments of pure meanness. The first of which involves Tiny Tim, who's waiting outside the office for his father. I think I'll cover that more next year.

The second moment is what I was alluding to above about Scrooge's attitude towards business. He leaves the office to finish his day at the Exchange and we see him playing hardball with some other gentlemen. Scrooge has corn that the others desperately want, but they haven't yet agreed on a price. Scrooge demands five percent more than what he asked the day before and threatens to raise the cost another five percent the following day if they don't agree to his terms. They point out that if he doesn't sell to them he'll be stuck with a warehouse full of useless corn, but he doesn't seem to care. I suspect he's bluffing, but he's very good at it and they cave. He's thoroughly convincing that he'd rather eat the cost of the corn than not be able to exploit these men and in turn their customers who - though poverty stricken - will have to pay more as well.

With that act of ruthlessness still fresh, the charitable solicitors (one of whom is played by Alfred from the '90s Batman movies) approach Scrooge. Still pleased from his victory over his peers, Scrooge is immediately rude to the solicitors before they even explain what they want. Unlike Reginald Owen's version though, the incivility of Scott's Scrooge makes sense. That's partly because the encounter is at the Exchange and he doesn't know of any business he needs to conduct with these guys, but even if he did have business with them, we've already seen the incivility with which he conducts his affairs. People do business with Scrooge because he's powerful and they have to, not because they want to. Dickens says that Scrooge is a powerful man on the Exchange, but unlike adaptations where Scrooge comes across as petty and pathetic, Scott makes me believe it.

Though Scrooge is mean to them, he does it with a perfect, gentlemanly smile until they mention giving to the poor. At that point his grin drops and it's clear that he thinks they're complete lunatics. The conversation follows Dickens closely, which means that it's a little weird and the two, kind-hearted gentlemen come off as clueless at best and doddering at worst. They don't pick up on the clear message that Scrooge not only isn't interested, but is morally opposed to helping anyone but himself. With that, I'm back to understanding him again. I may not like him, but I get why he feels superior when surrounded by such fools.

'You Wish to Be Anonymous?' | Scrooge McDuck (1983)

Index of other entries in The Christmas Carol Project

Possibly because Mickey's Christmas Carol puts as much value on humor as on faithfulness to Dickens, its Scrooge is arguably the most relatable version ever. As I've mentioned before, Disney's Scrooge isn't a miserable miser; he's a merry one. Unlike most other Scrooges, he gets joy out of his wealth and has a robust sense of humor. That's never more evident than in his encounter with the charitable solicitors, played in this version by Rat and Mole from The Wind in the Willows. (I used to get Rat confused with Basil from The Great Mouse Detective, because of his pipe and hat, but that character looks completely different.)

When Rat and Mole enter, Scrooge first thinks that they're Fred, coming back to irritate Scrooge some more. And why not? He quickly realizes his mistake though and warmly welcomes the pair, now thinking that they're customers. And again, why wouldn't he? For all his silliness, this Scrooge behaves more rationally around prospective customers than either Reginald Owen or the cartoon version of Alastair Sim.

Of course, when their true purpose is revealed, Scrooge changes his tune, but not dramatically or even noticeably. He has this in common with the cartoon Sim: he has a private joke at their expense. In Disney Scrooge's case, he cheerfully defeats them with logic, pointing out that if they give money to the poor, they won't be poor anymore, which means that Rat and Mole won't have to raise money for them anymore and will be out of a job. "Oh, please, gentlemen," he concludes. "Don't ask me to put you out of a job. Not on Christmas Eve!"

As he does this, he shows them outside, almost without their even realizing it. Once there, he turns nasty and throws Fred's wreath at them, saying that they can give that to the poor. Finally rid of them, he states outright his problem with charity: "What's this world coming to, Cratchit? You work all your life to get money, and people want you to give it away." It's the most clear - and again, relatable - rationale for Scrooge's bad behavior that we'll ever get in any version.

I'm not saying that a rational, relatable Scrooge is preferable to the more sinister, dramatically wicked versions, but it's a unique take and I'm glad it exists.

'You Wish to Be Anonymous?' | Marvel Classic Comics #36 (1978)

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Before I get to Marvel's version of the charitable solicitors, I just want to acknowledge a couple of Christmas Carol adaptations that I'm not covering this year because they don't include the scene. Teen Titans #13 is only loosely following Dickens story as it contemporizes it (to 1968) and works in a criminal plot for its teenage superheroes, so it's understandable that it jettisons our charitable gentlemen. I was a little more surprised though to see them gone from Rankin-Bass' The Stingiest Man in Town. It's a shorter adaptation and we've already talked about how this scene is an understandable cut, but the even shorter Disney version manages to keep them in.

Anyway, Doug Moench and Friends offer a severely trimmed version of the scene in Marvel's adaptation. One notable addition to it is Scrooge's repeating the word "liberality," which drives home nicely for younger readers the humor of the solicitor's mistaken assumption. After that though, the conversation is so truncated that when Scrooge says that they can put him down for nothing, that's the first chance he's had to object. The gentlemen are understandably confused and offer him the opportunity to be anonymous. This is the second time we've seen the scene work that way (the Shower of Stars episode being the first) and I like it. It makes more sense than Dickens' version, frankly.

What doesn't make sense is the violence with which Scrooge finishes the scene. His response to the offer of anonymity is to shake his cane in the second gentleman's face and the panel that follows that one is a close up of Scrooge's face, enraged almost to the point of insanity as he shrieks about the surplus population. If Fred was acting a little inconsistently in the previous scene, Scrooge is even more so in this one. The problem is that the various artists are trying to add energy to the story, but are doing it in unnatural ways. Characters can't just be frustrated with each other, they have to be furious. All the reactions are extreme, including in the last panel of the scene where the two gentlemen literally run out of the office as if frightened for their lives. It makes for a visually exciting comic, but not for organic storytelling.

'You Wish to Be Anonymous?' | Alastair Sim (1971)

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As we noticed last year with Fred, Chuck Jones' Scrooge is mostly an unemotional fellow. I wondered if that might be a flaw of the animation and voice acting, but with the solicitors I see that it's a deliberate choice.

As Fred leaves Scrooge's office, the solicitors come in and Scrooge rolls his eyes. It's impossible to tell if he's doing that because of his encounter with his nephew or if it's at the prospect of yet another interruption. Since he doesn't yet know why they're here, it reminds me of the rudeness of Reginald Owen's Scrooge. I can see why people go with that choice, but it makes Scrooge less human and more of a caricature. I like to think that this one is rolling his eyes at his nephew, just at an inopportune time.

As the very portly men explain their purpose in visiting, Scrooge taps his face drowsily with his quill. He asks them about the prisons and workhouses, but he's calm and sounds genuinely inquisitive. He's playing with them, even making pathetic faces as he talks. Like with Fred, there's no passion in the scene, but with these two men Scrooge is at least replacing his traditional anger and frustration with something else. It's a weird something else, but the result of both scenes is an aloof, cold-hearted Scrooge who's completely in control.

That's further supported in his reciting some of the solicitors' dialogue before they have a chance to. By the end of the scene, he's literally carrying both sides of the conversation and they don't even have a chance to recite the line about being anonymous. There's no doubt where he stands and they leave as soon as he wishes them a polite, but firm "good afternoon."

'You Wish to Be Anonymous?' | Albert Finney (1970)

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Albert Finney's musical Scrooge moves the charitable solicitors to later in the story, after Cratchit's already gone home and Scrooge is himself heading out for the night. The two men, one quite portly, accost Scrooge in the street outside his office and follow him for a way, trying to talk him into contributing.

The move of the scene doesn't seem to be about the story so much as it does about musical numbers. After Cratchit leaves, he has a song with his children while going about the pleasant task of Christmas shopping. In contrast, Scrooge's encounter with the solicitors propels him into a song as he makes his way through the Christmas crowds, singing about his hatred for humanity. More on those songs when we get to those sections, but it's important to note that this version feels free to adjust the story to fit the needs of the music.

Regarding the solicitors themselves, they're as annoying as Scrooge's nephew was in the earlier scene. They seem particularly clueless about getting the message that Scrooge isn't going to give them anything. Unlike other versions where Scrooge is kind of trapped in his office, this Scrooge has the option of walking away and he takes it. Stubbornly, the pushy solicitors block his way and - once he moves around them - follow him until he gets so angry that he swings his cane and screams about decreasing the surplus population. He's a mean person and it's hard to sympathize with him too much, but I can start to see why he launches into the misanthropic song right after this. So far, the Christmas celebrants Scrooge has encountered have been insufferable.

'You Wish to Be Anonymous?' | Fredric March (1954)

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The Christmas Carol episode of Shower of Stars continues the tradition in the early adaptations of putting the solicitors in front of Fred. It even uses the pair as an introduction to Scrooge himself. We meet them on the street, collecting a donation from another pleasant gentleman before heading into the next place on their list: Scrooge and Marley's. It's a nice move, letting us witness the success they're used to before hitting us with Scrooge's cranky rejection.

The script moves around some of the dialogue so that the solicitors get to their purpose more quickly than usual and ask Scrooge what they can put him down for. When he says "nothing" and they ask if he wants to be anonymous, it makes sense because he hasn't yet had a chance to make his feelings about the poor known to them. His response that he wants to be left alone leads them to expand on why they're there as they try to convince him.

One other remarkable thing is the look Scrooge has after his remark about decreasing the surplus population. He pauses and smiles broadly to himself, incredibly pleased with his cleverness. It's a weird expression and somewhat out of character for the traditional Scrooge. It'll bear watching to see if he exhibits a similar sense of humor as the story progresses.

The solicitors are so flummoxed by his refusal to chip in that they just stand slack-jawed in his office until he gets up and shows them the door with a grouchy "good afternoon."

'You Wish to Be Anonymous?' | Alastair Sim (1951)

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1951's Scrooge is another adaptation that puts the visit by the charitable solicitors in front of Scrooge's nephew. I speculated why that was last year and I'm happy to see that my previous thoughts match the theory I came up with this year, which is that putting the solicitors first is a way of presenting Scrooge's general worldview before honing in on his personal issues with Christmas and his nephew.

Alastair Sim's version began by showing us Scrooge at work at the London Exchange, interacting with other businessmen. When he gets back to his office, he has more ‘business’ to conduct, but this time with people looking for handouts. Seeing how he reacts to them makes a nice transition from the business world to the purely personal visit of his nephew.

The Scrooge we saw on the Exchange and Scrooge as he is around his nephew are very different characters. On the Exchange, Scrooge is energetic and dangerous. Where his sister’s boy is concerned, he's less sure of himself. It’s the first chink we see in the armor he so effectively wears around other people of business, including the charity solicitors. By switching Fred and the solicitors, the film can head into the next events with Scrooge less at ease and less on his guard. It’s a great piece of character development.

As for the solicitors, they're waiting for Scrooge when he gets back to his office from the Exchange. This version has them as thin men, which I won't read into, but is a departure from Dickens. Curiously (since they've been hanging out with Cratchit for who knows how long), they still don't know if Scrooge is Scrooge or Marley. Wouldn't Marley's death be something they learned when they introduced themselves to Cratchit?

There's a great, comical moment when the lead solicitor talks about Marley's "generosity" being represented by his surviving partner and Scrooge simply walks away and goes into his office. He's not inviting the gentlemen to follow, he's dismissing them, very rudely, and the speaker misses a beat of his speech as he tries to process what just happened.

He recovers though and with his partner follows Scrooge into the office, explaining the reason for the visit. The rest of the scene isn't played for laughs, but Sim is darkly funny as he questions the men. "A few of us are endeavoring to raise a fund," one of them says, "to buy the poor some meat and drink and means of warmth." "Why?" says Scrooge. And he genuinely doesn't know.

As the solicitor explains, Scrooge smiles, amused by the notion. He actually laughs when they ask how much they can put him down for. He's still very confident and in control, which will change once Fred shows up.

The solicitors, on the other hand, are shocked and confused by Scrooge's statements. They're severe, serious men (not like the pleasant gentlemen from Reginald Owen's version who seemed so passionate about their work), but they're also quite genuine in their concern for the poor and don't understand why Scrooge doesn't share it. "You wish to be anonymous?" doesn't come across as a legitimate question, but as a last-ditch effort to get a donation. These men know what's going on, but are grasping at straws.

I love that this version includes Scrooge's line about the poor not being his business. The script changes Dickens' text dramatically and effectively. "Isn't it, sir?" replies the lead gentleman in a way that makes me want to cheer. Sadly, Scrooge gets even more grumpy and insistent that no, it's not any of his business. He quickly dismisses the men with a gruff "good afternoon" and they exchange a frustrated look between themselves and leave.

'You Wish to Be Anonymous?' | Classics Illustrated #53 (1948)

George D Lipscomb and Henry Kiefer's adaptation for Classics Illustrated only gives five panels to the charitable solicitors and cuts out huge chunks of the dialogue. They don't even have time to get confused about whether Scrooge is going to contribute. He makes it very clear that he won't and they very briefly try to change his mind before they give up and leave.

It's a perfunctory presentation, which is probably the point. Part of the value of the shorter adaptations is seeing what they think is crucial to the story. Lipscomb and Kiefer wanted the solicitors so that Scrooge's wider selfishness is seen (as opposed to his narrower selfishness about Christmas), but saw no need for Dickens' nuance.

One thing this version reminds me of is that the men are "portly." That's right out of Dickens, but I glossed over it earlier. These are not people who deny themselves pleasure as a matter of habit. They're not skipping meals so that others might be fed. I think it's interesting that Dickens specifically calls that out, though he doesn't judge them for it and neither will I. Perhaps he just means to suggest that they're wealthy before they open their mouths, but I like the question that it raises even if I don't have an answer ready in response. How much should the wealthy give up for the sake of the poor?

'You Wish to Be Anonymous?' | Reginald Owen (1938)

Scrooge's nephew, still maintaining his Christmas spirit after an unpleasant conversation with his uncle, wishes a Merry Christmas to two, incoming gentlemen as he leaves. Thanks to the set up of Scrooge's office in this version (with Scrooge having a separate room and Cratchit's occupying the foyer), the gentlemen greet Cratchit first and there's a lightly humorous moment as they mistake him first for Marley and then for Scrooge.

Scrooge comes out during this though and quickly corrects them. He doesn't know what they're here for yet, but he's already in a bad mood, possibly because of his encounter with Fred, but of course we get the feeling that he's sort of always that way. This is no way to address potential customers, but this Scrooge is so miserable that he doesn't care.

This version actually gives names to the two gentlemen: Twill and Rummidge. Further humanizing them, the script also allows them to share the conversation instead of following Dickens' lead and just having one of them interact with Scrooge.

We learn about Marley's death for the first time in this version when Scrooge explains it to the men, and the detail that it was seven years ago. That's just following Dickens, but it works just fine as exposition too, though we don't get a sense yet of the kind of man Marley was. Of course, that will become very clear later when we meet his ghost.

There's a nice reaction shot of Cratchit as he nods at Rummidge's explanation of the reason for their visit. Charles Coleman and Matthew Boulton are well cast as the gentlemen. They have a clean, pleasant look to them and both men communicate gentle kindness and compassion for the people they're trying to help. The music makes it an overly sentimental scene, but it's genuinely touching acting by Coleman, Boulton, and Gene Lockhart as Cratchit.

Scrooge on the other hand is just mean. This interaction has none of the brief glimpses of regret in Scrooge that we saw in his conversation with Fred. He's got no time for these guys and wants them out as quickly as possible.

They seem to get that he's not with them, but still hopefully offer him the line about being anonymous when he says he to put him down for nothing. They've given some disturbed looks prior to that in the conversation, but even then they don't quite believe that he's as mean and cold as he seems to be. They can't seem to imagine it until he offers the final line about decreasing the surplus population. At that point they look very concerned; about Scrooge as much as about anything else, which further illustrates their sincerity and compassion. They're really a wonderful pair and are going to be the ones to beat as my favorite portrayal of these characters.