The Dreams in the Witch House

Events / 11/17/2008 5:11:01 PM

Our resident theatre lover/writer/aficionado, Ms. Cooney, brings us lovely words about the freshly launched classic horror adaptation from WildClaw Theatre. WildClaw is the Chicago horror theatre company that premiered with The Great God Pan last March that we enjoyed so much. This latest piece is no exception!

WALTER GILMAN: "What's on the menu for tonight?"

BROWN JENKINS: "Cheeeldren."

- Witch House, Act II

Any show that starts out with infanticide and ends with... But I can't tell you the end, can I? Or won't, at any rate. Think about it, though. How would you finish a play that begins with - not one, mark you, but two - two brutal stabbings, a law officer a little too fond of his belt strap, and a gun that doesn't wait a whole Chekhovian act (or even a whole scene) before going off?

Perhaps the question is, how would H. P. Lovecraft have ended this play? Or better - how would soft-spoken adaptor/director Charley Sherman?

Me, I'm fresh out of this whole "changeless, legend-haunted city of Arkham" WildClaw Theatre experience. So I know all about its horrific culmination. And if you head over to The Athenaeum in Chicago any time before December 21st, you'll be in on the secret too.

The Dreams in the Witch House is spectacular, in the old school, carnival funhouse sense of the word. Not without its flaws, Dreams is colorful good fun, with blood spatters, synthesized organs, whispering walls, neon pentagrams, and the occasional tentacle.

Do you like your theatre eerie, gory and surprisingly witty? Enjoy your protagonists pale and plagued by witches? Your good guys questionable (to say the least), and your bad guys such gibbering maniacs that the word "bad" no longer applies? The Dreams in the Witch House has it all. Plus The Necronomicon. Which is just cool.

While Dreams, apparently opining that subtlety is for wussies, will unabashedly roll out the canned wolf howls and an asthmatic fog machine, it will also creep deeply where the creepy counts. This show generates massive atmosphere with little more than a few very well-placed light gels and the tilted angles of a mad (but clever!) scene designer. Cheers for WildClaw's design team, which had to create everything from "a rat with a human's face, or a human in a rat's body," to a nightmare dimension that Einstein might have once moaned about in a fever dream. Amazing what you can do with ping-pong balls and a black light!

The acting, like the timing and the dialects, was uneven. To be fair, this was opening night, and jitters may account for the occasional inconsistencies. There were some very strong performances. Each actor had a moment when he or she shone with particular febrile brilliance. (Usually with weapon in hand, true.) All the actors spoke the peculiar language of Lovecraft and Sherman fluently, delivering terms like "eldritch" with remarkable aplomb.

Ultimately, I count my time in WildClaw's dark dream of Arkham City well spent. Like Old Man Maurewicz says of the Witch House, with a little shrug, "I'm just a tenant. I don't do anything. I just live here. . . with the monsters." And so did I tonight. And so should you.

Make reservations for your ticket to another dimension. And may the Elder Gods be with you.

Jill's p.s. Don't forget to brush up on the original Lovecraft text. You can get a copy of "The Dreams in the Witch House and Other Weird Stories" from our Killer-store.