An Original English-Language Musical
Created byAlexandre Diaconu
Book, music and lyricsAlexandre Diaconu
Original stage directionAlexandre Diaconu
LanguageEnglish
The Story
Before the night is over, Scrooge must confront the life he chose.
London, 1863. Ebenezer Scrooge has built his life upon fear, control, and the conviction that the world belongs to those ruthless enough to survive it. He despises Christmas, rejects compassion as weakness, and keeps every human being at a distance. Beneath his cruelty lies a man haunted by his dead partner, Jacob Marley, and by memories he has spent a lifetime trying to bury.
On Christmas Eve, Marley returns in chains to warn him that his actions have disturbed the balance of the world. Before the night is over, Scrooge will be visited by three ancient spirits: Remembrance, Gratitude, and Death.
The Ghost of Christmas Past forces him to confront the violence of his childhood, the solitude that shaped him, and the love he sacrificed for security and wealth. The Ghost of Christmas Present reveals the fragile joy of the Cratchit family, Tiny Tim’s approaching death, Fred’s stubborn belief that some light may still exist within his uncle, and the monstrous human consequences of Ignorance and Want.
Finally, the silent Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come leads Scrooge towards an unlamented corpse, a child’s grave, and the broken tombstone bearing his own name.
Faced with the legacy of the life he has chosen, Scrooge does not ask for salvation. He asks that Tiny Tim be allowed to live. When Christmas morning returns him to the world of the living, he must transform revelation into action, repair what he has broken, and confront the final person he has never been able to forgive: himself.
The Dramatic World
Memory, gratitude, and death restore the balance of a human life.
Scrooge’s cruelty is not presented as inexplicable evil, but as the final shape of unhealed trauma, isolation, and a desperate need to protect himself from a world he learned to see as savage. Wealth becomes his fortress, solitude his form of control, and hatred his defence against being hurt again.
The past cannot be erased, but it can be understood. The future cannot be known, but it can still be changed. The present is the only space in which a human being can choose, give, repair, and live.
Through Tiny Tim, the Cratchit family, Ignorance, and Want, the musical confronts poverty, social injustice, and the human cost of indifference. Redemption begins when remorse becomes responsibility and compassion becomes action.
At Its Heart
What can still change while there is time?
Memory as confrontation
Gratitude as choice
Mortality as truth
Compassion as action
Redemption as responsibility
From the Creator
“I wanted to enter the darkness behind Scrooge’s cruelty.”
I did not want to create a comforting Christmas tale about a cruel man who becomes kind overnight. I wanted to ask what could make a human being reject love, compassion, and the very idea of belonging to others.
In this version, the three spirits are not simply visitors from another world. They are Remembrance, Gratitude, and Death, three forces that preserve the balance of human existence. We are shaped by what we remember, sustained by what we are able to value, and defined by what we choose to do with the limited time given to us. Scrooge has rejected all three.
The musical becomes a descent into a wounded mind. Each spirit tears away another layer of the identity Scrooge has constructed until he is forced to see the frightened child, the abandoned lover, and the terrified old man existing within the same body. His transformation does not erase the harm he has caused, nor demand immediate forgiveness. It gives him something more difficult: the responsibility to change while there is still time.
For me, the heart of the story lies in the moment when Scrooge stands before his own grave and asks for nothing for himself. He does not plead for his soul or attempt to escape punishment. He asks that a child should live. That is the first truly selfless choice he has made, and the beginning of his return to humanity.
A Christmas Carol is a symphonic musical thriller about the shadows we inherit, the chains we forge, and the possibility that even the darkest life can change when compassion becomes an act rather than an intention.
Alexandre DiaconuCreator, composer, writer, and stage directorOn Stage
Inside the production
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Production and Licensing
Bring A Christmas Carol to a new stage.
For production, presentation, collaboration, adaptation, and licensing enquiries, contact The New Musical Company.
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