Scrooge (1913 film)

Scrooge is a 1913 British black and white silent film based on the 1843 novel A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. It starred Seymour Hicks as Ebenezer Scrooge. In the United States it was released in 1926 as Old Scrooge.

The film's cast included Seymour Hicks as Scrooge, William Lugg, Leedham Bantock, J. C. Buckstone, Dorothy Buckstone, Leonard Calvert, Osborne Adair, Adela Measor and Ellaline Terriss. Hicks had played the role of Scrooge regularly onstage since 1901 before this, his first appearance in the role in film. He reprise the role of Scrooge again, in the 1935 film Scrooge.

Scrooge was a Zenith Film Company production, by whom it was also distributed on its release date in September 1913. Some scenes in the black and white 35mm film were colour toned.

The opening credits are followed by a scene in which Charles Dickens is seen pacing his library seeking inspiration for a new story. It comes to him and he settles down to write A Christmas Carol. A short introductory synopsis describing miserly London businessman Ebenezer Scrooge leads into a shot of his nephew Fred Wyland giving money to poor children on Christmas Eve. Scrooge, upon leaving his office, is chased by poor children. At the office, Scrooge's clerk Bob Cratchit bids goodbye to his crippled son Tiny Tim and goes to work. A poor woman comes to the office to beg from Scrooge but he turns her away. Cratchit gives her money. At Middlemarks, the poor line up for food. When the food runs out, Middlemark goes to Scrooge for assistance but he is turned away. Scrooge gives Cratchit a second hand quill as a Christmas present and after Cratchit has gone, he settles down with his money to sleep.

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