By STU CLAMPITT
news@readthereporter.com
Kate Hinman had taken a little break from theater before agreeing to direct Uh-Oh, Here Comes Christmas! for Carmel Community Players (CCP). Hinman told The Reporter she got a copy of the script form Lori Raffel to help her decide if this was the show to bring her back into the community theater world.
“It is a series of vignettes, and after the third vignette I knew I wanted to do it because it is just a wonderful show,” Hinman said.
This charming show takes a funny, heartwarming and often poignant look at the struggle to find the spirit of the holidays amid the avalanche of commercialism, stress and chaos that crashes down every December.
The play is a collection of Christmas stories taken from Robert Fulghum’s books. Fulghum is the best-selling author of All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten.
With a cast of five, there are several characters who only exist in the imagination.
Photo provided by Tanya Haas
“For example, there is a wedding scene where a Catholic man and a Jewish girl get married,” Hinman said. “You never actually see them, but you know that they’re there. Truly, this is an actor’s show. There is no fourth wall. They are constantly moving between narrating and interacting with these unseen characters on stage. It has very minimal props and a lot of stuff is mimed.”
Hinman said she was blessed with easy casting for this show.
“The second night of auditions, four people showed up and they were all perfect,” Hinman said. “So, I just cast them that night. It took me about another week to find the fifth person. After the first readthrough, they just meshed. We are having a ball in rehearsals. We laugh so much every night.”
There are abundant of laughs to be found in this show, but there are also some deeply touching moments.
“I have already said we need to have Kleenex in the auditorium,” Hinman said. “These are stories people are going to relate to. It’s a very human show. It’s not like any play I have ever directed. It’s not a story that starts at one end and ends at the other.”
It is also a show that will bring audiences both the magic of Christmas and of good theater.
“It is a very non-standard show,” Hinman said. “I want the audience to know they are going to experience magic and to use their imaginations. I’m working very hard with the cast to make sure as they are miming things that the interact with the unseen characters. We know they are supposed to be there, but the audience has to ‘see’ them. I think that will come very easily to audiences once the show begins.”
Uh-Oh, Here Comes Christmas! stages for two weekends from Dec. 9 to 18 at The Cat, 254 Veterans Way, Carmel. Go to carmelplayers.org/tickets or call (317) 815-9387 for tickets.