A Christmas Carol

This short, one hour version was shot entirely on video for television by the BBC and broadcast in the U.K. on two occasions, Christmas Eve 1977 and 1979. Because of the proliferation of other versions, the BBC has never made a full-length movie, and so this abridgment continues to live as their only color version and has been issued on VHS and DVD.

Michael Hordern (Ebenezer Scrooge) previously played Jacob Marley in A Christmas Carol (1951) and A Christmas Carol (1971).

Old Joe is absent in this production, but Mrs. Dilber and the Undertaker appear in the same scene as Scrooge's shrouded body. Mrs. Dilber is both Scrooge's former laundress and charlady in this television movie.

Scrooge was likely based on a real person named John Meggot, (born John Elwes), who was a local celebrity, a member of Parliment, and a famous miser from Dickens' part of England, and who was dead by the time Dickens was born, but whom Dickens heard much local lore and urban legends from the English townspeople where Scrooge grew up; family, friends, etc. A recent article uncovers facts about the famous miser from Parliment's life: "John was educated the the Westminster School, an exclusive boarding school in Westminster Abbey in London. He spent more than a decade there, then lived in Switzerland for a few years before returning to England. When he was in his twenties and thirties, Meggot gave little hint of the man he would become. He dressed well, spent money freely, and moved among London's most fashionable circles. He developed a taste for French wines and fine dining. He was a skilled horseman and fox hunter, and he had a passion for gambling -he bet, and often lost, thousands of pounds in card game". The eccentric politician became the subject of local lore because he was so stingy and selfish; and his eccentric life style: "where his own comfort and material well-being were concerned, Elwes would not part with a penny. Where once he dressed in rags only to impress his uncle, he now wore them all the time, and never cleaned his shoes -that might wear them out faster. Friends said he looked "like a prisoner confined for debt."Like his uncle, Elwes allowed his estates to fall into ruin. He refused to buy a carriage and wondered how anyone could think he could afford one. Riding a horse was cheaper, especially the way he did it: before setting off on a journey, he'd fill his pockets with hardboiled eggs so he wouldn't have to pay for meals in taverns. He rode in the soft dirt by the side of the road rather than on the road itself, so that he wouldn't have to buy horseshoes for his horses. He traveled hours out of the way to avoid toll roads. If he needed to stop for the night, he'd find a spot by the side of the road that had lots of grass (so that his horse could eat for free) and sleep beneath a tree to save the price of a room at an inn. Elwes' mania for frugality extended to his own family. He had two sons out of wedlock (because marriage cost money) and refused to pay for their education. "Putting things into people's heads," he explained, "was the sure way to take money out of their pockets."' Dickens heard all of this and was inspired to put together a fable about how the modern virtues of capitalism come head to head with the old fashioned values of Christmas; and how this character would have to make a choice between the two.