The intimacy projected at the Hatbox Theater the past seven years brought Scrooge’s silver mutton chops to life.

The theater, tucked into a corner of the Steeplegate Mall, offers audiences clear details from every nook and cranny, revealing expressions and emotions and facial hair from 19th century London that easily reach out into the four rows of seats in front of the stage.

“A Christmas Carol,” ends its run at the Hatbox this weekend, leaving just one performance by the Queen City Improv on Dec. 29 before the theater closes as part of the huge renovation project scheduled to start as early as next year.

Soon, the owners, Andrew and Jill Pinard, will intensify their search for a new home, hoping to retain the ambiance they created at Hatbox.

“We’ve been talking to other venues,” Andrew Pinard said. “It’s hard to share with other groups, so unless we can find a venue we can call our own, we’ll have to change what we do. The Hatbox experience is unique. One hundred seats, all close and all around the stage.”

As news of the impending closure spread, some residents here and in surrounding towns regretted that they had essentially ignored what amounted to a weekend night out to attend a high-quality performance, sharply produced.

Laurie Haney of Boscawen is a hostess at the Common Man restaurant. A customer there told her she’d seen “A Christmas Carol” at the Hatbox and loved it. She also mentioned that the Hatbox was closing its doors, and soon.

“I went online and bought tickets that night,” Haney said during intermission Sunday. “I knew it was here. I just never had the chance to go or I never thought about looking for the chance to go. I was told it was closing and I was really sad about that.”

The Steeplegate Mall has been sad territory for years, crushed by online shopping and other industry trends. But like other malls around the country, it attracted new types of tenants, like Hatbox, a gym, a trampoline park and even a charter school at one point as it shed retail tenants.

Hatbox opened in 2016 in what had been a Coldwater Creek store, heralding efforts by then-owners Namdar Realty to keep the struggling mall viable. The theater has flourished even as the mall slowly emptied.

The Pinards hoped that the new developer, Onyx Partners of Needham, Mass., would allow them to stay open until at least the summer.

Unlike businesses such as JC Penney, the Zoo Health Club and Altitude Trampoline Park – which have long-term contracts and can remain as hundreds of apartments and retail stores rise around them – the Hatbox must close, with a final run of “A Christmas Carol” ending on Sunday, Dec. 17.

No plans have been announced for the other units that must leave in January, like All-Stars Pickleball and Talbot’s.

An improvisational show is slated for Dec. 29. Then, the lights go down for good. The space must be empty by the end of next month.

“To me, this is bittersweet,” said Jill Pinard. “I’m not sad yet at this point. I’m proud.”

Jim Spiegel, 67, graduated from Concord High School and has been performing all his life. He’s been acting at the Hatbox for two years.

He played the part of the late Jacob Marley, a ghost and Scrooge’s business partner who had lived a selfish, greedy life. Just like Scrooge had.

Marley walked the stage with chains around his neck and draped over his body, a prisoner paying for his harsh deeds while still alive.

The rattling of the chains and the wailing of regret created by Marley’s wasted life seemed louder, bolder, and more pronounced with the audience of just 100 enjoying crystal clear visions of the scene.

“It’s really too bad,” Spiegel said, “because this is the only theater of its kind around here where so many groups come in and do amazing theater versus places like the Capitol Center or the City Auditorium, where it’s hundreds and hundreds of people from musical comedies or things like that, so the hope for everybody is that they’ll find a new home similar to this. With small seating, it’s great for the audience to be so close to the actors.”

Scrooge meets the Ghost of Christmas past. He sees himself as a young man, courting the beautiful Belle, played by Marjorie Boyer of Merrimack. They fall in love, and you can see the affection in their eyes. No matter where you sit.

Later, Scrooge chooses money over Belle’s love, and the sadness in her eyes at that moment, easy for all to see, is heartbreaking.

Boyer, 28, has a theater degree from the University of New Hampshire and has performed all over New England. She’s done costume design and worked with props. The Hatbox was her kind of venue.

“I’m quite frankly devastated,” Boyer said. “We’re all pretending it’s not happening. Just such a loss for the community.”