About the Play:

The Farndale Christmas Carol is a holiday comedy with music by David McGillivray and Walter Zerlin Jr. Tired of the same old thing for the holidays? The hilarious play-within-a-play is set in the Farndale Avenue Housing Estate Townswomen's Guild Dramatic Society. This stalwart group of lady thespians brings ineptitude to new heights with their dizzily endearing, well-meaning assault on the Dickens Christmas classic.

The Farndale Christmas Carol is an irreverent romp through Dickens’ classic. In a festive mood, this theatre troupe of delightfully clumsy women mount another assault on the classics with their stage version of A Christmas Carol. Of course, the star actor is missing, the script is impossible to read, and walls keep falling down… but to some, chaos is an art form. There’s nothing a neck brace and a bit of tinsel can’t fix. The show must go on! They enthusiastically portray a dizzy array of characters from the Dickensian favourite (and a few which aren't), engineer some novel audience participation while bravely contending with an intrusive PA system and a real Farndale first – rap their vocal cords and feet around two original, show stopping songs. The Farndale Christmas Carol is a festive farce that proves disastrously funny.

The Farndale Christmas Carol is the fifth of the Farndale play series and premiered in 1987 at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. The play has been performed in regional repertory, high school, college, and community theatre productions.

Cast: 4 women, 1 man

What people say:

"Another classic dramatic massacre that enthralls." — The Independent (London)

"Not since the Monty Python mob dressed up as The Batley Townswomen's Guild and re-enacted the Battle of Pearl Harbor with their handbags have I tittered so much." — The Daily Mail (UK)

About the Playwrights:

David McGillivray and Walter Zerlin Jr. (1949-2001) have written 10 Farndale plays starting in 1976 with the ladies' version of "Macbeth" for the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. The Farndale ladies are known and loved worldwide.