Celine Dion definitely got the Christmas assignment. The iconic pop superstar went fully method for her holiday video this year, slipping into a lime green Grinch costume on Christmas Eve (Dec. 24) for a recitation of the holiday baddie’s overstuffed schedule.
In a clip shared this week, the singer posted up in a chair by a fire pit in the backyard and crooned her indelible cover of Eric Carmen’s maudlin ballad “All By Myself,” which Dion first recorded for her fourth English-language album, 1996’s Falling Into You. Of course, the sight of famously well-attired Dion goofily crooning the song while wearing a Santa getup over her green, furry costume was enough of a gift.
But then Dion made it a notch sillier by cutting to a shot of her holding one of her little pups on her lap while reciting a version of the Grinch’s lament about his busy schedule from the 2000 Ron Howard-directed, Jim Carrey-starring How the Grinch Stole Christmas.
“The nerve of those Whos, inviting me down there on such short notice. Even if I wanted to go, my schedule wouldn’t allow it!” Dion says as the dog wearing antlers like the Grinch’s pooch, Max, wriggles out of her grasp. “4:00 — exercise my voice. 4:30 — wake my children up. 5:00 — solve world hunger. Tell no one. 5:30 — jazzercize. 6:30 — dinner with me. I can’t cancel that again! 7:00 — wrestle with my creative ideas.”
The dramatic recitation goes on, as Dion-as-Grinch honks, “I’m booked! Of course, if I bumped my creative ideas to 9:00, I’ll still have time to lay in bed and scroll TikTok videos endlessly. Or I can just simply wish everyone a merry Christmas and a happy new year,” she adds mock contentedly before shouting, “boring!”
The video winds down with Dion crooning a bit more of the song, casually singing, “When I was young/ I never needed anyone.”
The appearance was one of the rare public outings this year from Dion, who was diagnosed with the neurological disorder stiff-person syndrome in 2022, which seriously affected her voice and caused uncontrolled tremors, forcing her to cancel a planned 2023-2024 world tour to focus on her health.