A Christmas Carol. In Prose. Being a Ghost Story of Christmas by Charles Dickens was an originally published as a novella in 1843. It is one of the most enduring, heart-warming stories of the Christmas spirit that has touched generations. It was originally inspired when Dickens visited an orphanage in London, England and was aghast at the poverty, greed, selfishness, and lack of human decency that pervaded Dickensian England. To address this issue, one obnoxious individual was visited by the Ghosts of The Present, The Past, and The Yet-To-Come. and forced to relive their best and worst moments of the year to encourage them to become better people.

There were the haves and the have nots, and not much in between. Screenwriters John Morris and Sean Anders (both from Instant Family, Horrible Bosses 2) spoke with Creative Screenwriting Magazine about their updated musical version called Spirited starring Ryan Reynolds as Clint Briggs (the slicker, snarkier version of Ebenezer Scrooge) and Will Ferrell as The Ghost Of The Present, who’s faced with an uphill battle after realizing “perp” Clint is no ordinary scrooge who will easily succumb to the spirit of Christmas.

Morris and Anders retained fidelity to Dickens’ intention of human decency and compassion during the holiday season. Perhaps a spirit that will last well beyond the festive season. When asked what they hypothetically might ask Charles Dickens if he made himself available during their story conferences for Spirited, Anders replied, “How do expand your original story to include all the types of inequality around today rather than just greed?”

Seam Anders

The screenwriters, weren’t concerned with replicating A Christmas Carol. The paid due homage to Dickens’ tale and gave it a modern twist. Their twist. With singing and dancing. They flipped the paradigm and made the Scrooge character the bad (but realistic) guy and the ghosts optimistic, but flawed. Morris and Anders decided to retell their story from the ghosts perspectives – ghosts facing their own existential crises of whether change is actually possible.

The ghosts of the Past, Presents and Yet-To-Come were given a hip overhaul to reflect the modern times – hashtags, influencers and all. Clint Briggs, who sounds more like a Tik Tok sensation about to release his own clothing line than a miserly scrooge meeting a business investor. He’s a media consultant on the pulse of pop culture who thrives on creating divisions in the community – them and us. “He has an answer for everything,” said Morris. Greed is the way of the world and that’s that.

He doesn’t have any close friends or enduring relationships to guide him. He’s self-aware of his flaws, but he doesn’t care. Money makes the world go round not good-heartedness. This is where the Ghosts come into play – to highlight where he’s been, where he’s at, and the possibilities that lie in service to Clint’s redemption – all while questioning their own value.

Both Morris and Anders disagree with the idea of a character undergoing such a massive character transplant, that they’re unrecognizable. All humans are flawed. Clint’s shifts are more subtle. There is no dramatic U-Turn. He becomes selfish and marginally more interested in how his actions impact those around him. “He is open to possibility of change, but not quite there yet,” said Anders.

Both the Ghost of The Present and Clint Briggs are more than stock characters with the Ghost choosing a dark soul to fix during Christmas and Clint resisting. Briggs actually has something to teach Present, who reflects upon and reassesses his own life after Clint lays down the rules of human nature. Present may even be forced to accept his limitations and concede that some people are incapable of change. They’re irredeemable. All that good work may not last.

John Morris

Gotta Sing Gotta Dance

Writing a musical is not a simple matter of adding music you can dance to dialogue. It requires lyrics with their own innate and distinct rhythms. Oscar-winners Benj Pasek and Justin Paul (L.A. Land) composed many of the songs in Spirited. “In the script, we wrote what the song was about in reference to the point in the story and the composers went to work,” added Anders.

True to their comedy roots, Spirited contains more than its fair share of risqué moments. “I do enjoy subverting expectations,” said Sean Anders. “If we could take the phrase ‘Good Afternoon’ and turn it into a middle finger, that would be fun for us,” he continued. John Morris mentioned a nod to John Hughes movies. “We always like the way he would sometimes break the fourth wall and use odd techniques such as Ferris Bueller talking into the camera as text is rolling in the screen.” They revelled in their irreverence and didn’t always play by the established rules of filmmaking.

We aspire to have a level of mischievousness in our stories – Sean Anders

This is especially evident when Clint assists his eighth-grade niece to create a scandal to win the student body presidential elections. Briggs’ number two, Kimberly (Octavia Spencer) is a bridge between Briggs and Present whom she can communicate with. Perhaps pushing Clint’s niece to cheat was a bridge too far for her? She questions her values while Clint remains steadfast in his. Redemption may only be possible for those who want it.