Mrs. Dilber is not one of Charles Dickens\u2019 most famous characters.<\/p>\n\n
Still, Ebenezer Scrooge\u2019s spunky housekeeper became a favorite of director Paul McCusker and his Radio Theatre (www.RadioTheatre.org) team during its production of \u201cA Christmas Carol.\u201d As a tribute, characters named Dilber were written into the Father Gilbert Mysteries and \u201cThe Legend of Squanto,\u201d while a \u201cDilberius\u201d appeared in a biblical series.<\/p>\n\n
McCusker also decided to continue this inside joke in his first radio script for \u201cThe Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe,\u201d turning a housekeeper named \u201cMrs. Macready\u201d into yet another \u201cMrs. Dilber.\u201d Douglas Gresham, the stepson of author C.S. Lewis, jumped on this tiny change as soon as he saw the script.<\/p>\n\n
\u201cHis logic was simple,\u201d recalled McCusker, laughing. \u201cHe said that the diehard fans will know that it\u2019s supposed to be Mrs. Macready because millions of them know these books cover to cover. Diehard fans will know we changed it and, for them, that will affect everything. Then they\u2019ll start calling and writing, wanting us to change the name back to Mrs. Macready. Why go through that?\u201d<\/p>\n\n
It was nearly a decade ago that McCusker began dramatizing \u201cThe Chronicles of Narnia,\u201d the Oxford don\u2019s fantasy series that has sold nearly 100 million copies in the past 55 years. Thus, McCusker has already worked his way through some of the creative and even theological issues faced by movie director Andrew \u201cShrek\u201d Adamson and the rest of the team that has turned \u201cThe Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe\u201d into a $150 million epic for Walden Media and Walt Disney Studios. Adamson has also worked closely with Gresham, whose mother, American poet Joy Gresham, married Lewis late in life.<\/p>\n\n
Legions of Lewis fans must realize, said McCusker, that turning books into movies requires changes. Today\u2019s digital artists can show in mere seconds what, in print, required many paragraphs to explain. Meanwhile, dramatic scenes that Lewis quickly sketched \u2014 such as massive battles involving talking beasts and magical creatures \u2014 will be expanded because this is what modern audiences want to see fleshed out on screen.<\/p>\n\n
\u201cYou have to make choices, but you have to make careful choices. If you take a major scene out, or you make a big change in the plot of a book that is this beloved, you are going to hear about it. Just ask Peter Jackson,\u201d said McCusker, referring to the director of \u201cThe Lord of the Rings\u201d movies.<\/p>\n\n
Gresham, 60, is serving as co-producer of the Narnia project. He stressed that he has, \u201cfor 30-odd years,\u201d dedicated himself to finding artists and entrepreneurs who share his commitment to faithfully capturing the themes in his stepfather\u2019s books.<\/p>\n\n
\u201cIt is my ambition to live long enough to see all seven Narnian Chronicles made into feature films,\u201d he said, during a recent visit to Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n\n
Because of recent leaps in technology, insiders realized that \u201cnow is the time to make this movie,\u201d said Gresham. \u201cIf you can imagine it today, then we can film it. \u2026 But I don\u2019t want people coming out of \u2018The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe\u2019 saying, \u2018Wow, what tremendous special effects.\u2019 I want people to look at each other, slightly bemused, and say, \u2018Where did they find a real centaur to play that role?\u2019 \u201c<\/p>\n\n
But Gresham knows that many viewers will dissect the movie\u2019s theology, even more than its production values. They will be especially tense when the Christ figure in Narnia, the lion Aslan, offers himself as a sacrifice.<\/p>\n\n
In a lengthy speech after his resurrection, Aslan explains that the evil White Witch \u201cknew the Deep Magic. But if she could have looked a little further back \u2026 she would have known that when a willing victim who had committed no treachery was killed in a traitor\u2019s stead, the Table would crack and Death itself would start working backwards.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
This is, as Time magazine noted, \u201cChristianity in a kid-lit veil.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
\u201cThey can change a speech like that a little. They may need to shorten it,\u201d stressed McCusker. \u201cIf they stay true to the spirit of what was written, people will understand what is happening. \u2026 Lewis has woven the Christian symbolism so tightly into the story that you can\u2019t cut it out without changing the story itself. The people who love this book are simply not going to let that happen.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Mrs. Dilber is not one of Charles Dickens\u2019 most famous characters. Still, Ebenezer Scrooge\u2019s spunky housekeeper became a favorite of director Paul McCusker and his Radio Theatre (www.RadioTheatre.org) team during its production of \u201cA Christmas Carol.\u201d As a tribute, characters named Dilber were written into the Father Gilbert Mysteries and \u201cThe Legend of Squanto,\u201d while […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":610,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[68,80,149,196,1542],"class_list":["post-1362","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-apologetics","tag-arts","tag-cs-lewis","tag-christian-media","tag-movies"],"yoast_head":"\n