Charm of ‘A Child’s Christmas’ Survives Production Dabbling

Director Thomas F. Bradac has reworked the Grove TheatreCompany’s annual production of Dylan Thomas’ “A Child’s Christmas in Wales,” a holiday entertainment that many felt was already in fine working order.

Gone this year (the production’s fourth) is the turntable set of a Welsh pub and Thomas’ Swansea home; Bradac decided the old look was too bulky, not “aesthetically satisfying.” The chummy living room, with its familiar banquet table, remains to hold the central action as the poet recalls the bittersweet moments of his best Christmas, when he was young enough to appreciate everything at face value.

Filling the stage with outsized presents wrapped in shiny foil paper and bold bows, Bradac and designer Gil Morales remind us that the season is tantamount to a fantasy world for children. The director may be having some fun as well: Do the surreal images also evoke the materialism of Christmas? The young Thomas, perkily played by Danny Oberbeck, certainly dwells on the gifts he is about to receive more than those he is about to give.

Bradac also felt that Thomas’ language, a mixture of poetic detail and diary prose (adapted for the stage by Jeremy Brooks and Adrian Mitchell), needed to be emphasized even more than in past years. And with Gary Bell employing his full baritone as the adult Thomas remembering when, all the lovely winter images (“irreligious snow,” “ear-pinching air”) do ring through.

The changes, though, are not extreme. The singing of several traditional carols by the able cast is still the show’s charming touchstone. This production is a bit more fanciful, even a tad precious. But in the end it summons the same feelings of earlier efforts--the pleasures of Christmas minus most of the mawkish overcoating that too often smothers other holiday productions.

The faults are pretty much the same as in previous efforts. Certain scenes--especially involving Thomas and his innocently roguish pals--seem overextended. There’s a pressing “It’s a Wonderful Life” sentimentality that bubbles up as Bradac and his cast linger, a little full of themselves. But as Christmas shows go, this one has been, and continues to be, remarkable--a tour through a holiday landscape raised above the mundane by the guide’s touching literary style.

‘A CHILD’S CHRISTMAS IN WALES’

A Grove Theatre Co. production of Jeremy Brooks and Adrian Mitchell’s play adapted from Dylan Thomas’ writings. Directed by Thomas F. Bradac. With Gary Bell, Danny Oberbeck, Kay Berlet, Daniel Christaens, Lorraine Fusare, Marnie Crossen, Jim Schoonover, Larry Fisher, Elizabeth Mendoza, Laurie Freed, Bud Leslie, Robert Fass, Rick Tigert, Jeani Finnerty, Irma Lozano and Sean McDevitt. Sets by Gil Morales. Lighting by David M. Darwin. Musical direction by Chuck Estes. Costumes by Laura E. Deremer. Choreography by Libbey Coghlan. Through Dec. 24, Wednesdays through Saturdays at 8 p.m.; Sundays at 7:30 p.m.; and Saturdays and Sundays at 3 p.m. at the Gem Theatre, 12852 Main St., Garden Grove. Tickets: $16 to $20. (714) 636-7213.