Babes With Blood Splatter
Events / 10/15/2007 11:02:19 PM
It's October, and in the United States (and to a smaller extent Canada) it's undeniably Haunted House season! Thousands of haunted environments spring up for the month leading to Halloween. From the 5 dollar amateur backyard variety to the big professional 45 dollar VIP gig, they all largely consist of thrusting yourself in a long, loud line-up of the under 25yr old crowd to spend 20 minutes fumbling around black hallways into small rooms of jump-at-you scares and chainsaw wielding demonic clowns. And while I'm all for the traditional house scares (Haunted House article coming soon!), I'm pleased to have just discovered a new twist on the Haunted Horror.
The infamous, Chicago, all-female ensemble Babes With Blades have launched a mini, Hitchcock-ian stage play experience; "Horror Academy". This series of three independent "acts" interspersed with smaller vignettes, written by Darren Callahan and directed by Jeremy Wechsler, are aptly set in the turn of the century Gunder Mansion. For 90 minutes you're escorted through dark, foggy corridors and creepy stairwells into disturbing tales of theatrical horror with a range of settings from Victorian blood banks to the Louisiana Bayou.
Babes with Blades are well known for exploring theatrical violence and their lovely trend continues with Horror Academy. Starting with the blades, nurses get slashed and slurped in "Three Lines"; humanitarian volunteers slowly move from needle stabbings to guns and worse in "Everything's Different Here"; and in "Where is the Breakdown?" car crash victims polish things off with a good knife brawling finish! Throughout it all you are a front row voyeur to skilled women battling amongst themselves and the supernatural (vamps, zombies, cannibals, oh my!) all the while surrounded by great sound, eerie sets, and blood splattering effects.
Much like the Haunted Houses scares are seasonal, Horror Academy "classes" are only in session from October 13th to November 4th. That just gives you 3 short weeks to see the Babes in live horror action before they move on to other ventures and venues.
So if you're looking for a thought provoking alternative to the simple boo-gotcha maniac howling down a black light hallway to get your Halloween kicks then get thee to Horror Academy where their motto is, "You Haven't Got a Hope in Hell."
A nurse self medicates in "Three Lines"
Yours in ass-kicking gore, Jill
p.s. Have any Haunted Houses or Halloween Haunts in your area worth writing about? Let us know at comments@killer-works.com
