Despite living in Qatar, Richard Wilkins committed to role as Scrooge

Styled as a proper 19th century English gentleman on a recent December evening, Richard Wilkins expectantly stands in the brightly lit atrium of West Valley City's Hale Centre Theatre in full costume: knee-length topcoat covers silk vest covers white shirt garnished with a black ribbon tie.

Per the theater's custom, the cast of "A Christmas Carol" is greeting and thanking audience members as they exit the building. A bone-chilling winter storm swirls on the other side of double-paned windows, but inside it's downright toasty. Small beads of sweat on Wilkins' forehead reflect light cascading from a chandelier.

Minutes ago, Wilkins capped off two hours of the dancing, jumping and running away from ghosts that collectively constitute the role of Ebenezer Scrooge. As patrons descend down a lushly carpeted staircase and start shaking his hand, Wilkins still hasn't quite caught his breath from hoisting Tiny Tim up onto his right shoulder for the final curtain call.

Wilkins, a 59-year-old legal scholar and former law professor, is a loquacious sort never at a loss for words or a smile. Watching him chitchat with people from the audience, it's difficult to tell where a repentant Scrooge ends and the Tao of Wilkins begins. As interesting as it is to observe, though, the ease with which he effortlessly steps into and out of his stage persona is nevertheless no big surprise in light of the fact that 2011 marks his 27th year playing Ebenezer Scrooge for this theater group.

Indeed, since first portraying Scrooge in 1985, Wilkins has increasingly internalized the values Charles Dickens sought to convey in penning "A Christmas Carol." And in a compelling case of life imitating art, Wilkins now finds himself the director of an important international advocacy group that promotes family policy at places like the United Nations — a job perfectly tailored to put into practice the values of Dickens' timeless tale. Never mind that that job is in Qatar or that he is now a battle-tested policy guru whose time is worth much money; the lessons of "A Christmas Carol" are so deeply rooted in Wilkins' soul that every November he makes a point of sojourning back to Utah for another reprisal of his beloved Scrooge role.

Becoming Scrooge

Hale Centre Theatre was co-founded in 1985 by Sally Dietlein and her husband's grandparents, Ruth and Nathan Hale. Ruth heard Wilkins speak in church one Sunday and was enamored with his oratory skills, so she arranged for him to appear in the theater's first production.