By Timothy Ruppert
We may now find ourselves very near to Thanksgiving, but the Haunted Theatre Company sees to it that every evening is Halloween—or, more precisely, Devil’s Night. Founded by Michael McGovern, an accomplished impresario of ghoulish and uncanny entertainments, the Haunted Theatre Company completes its inaugural season with A Whisper. . .To A Scream, the umbrella title for a quartet of new short-form horror pieces designed to unsettle and surprise.
The Margaret Partee Performing Arts Center transforms into Restless Meadows, a cemetery of stony arches and weeping angels and the domain of the cowled, cryptic figure named Mortis Macabre (billed as ‘Himself’). Macabre acts as a guide, providing frame narration and intercalary commentary—excellently written and directed by James Michael Shoberg—with grim mirth.
The evening opens with “Daughter of Horror,” written by McGovern and directed by Nicole Brady. Amanda (Jocelyn Stoffel), nicknamed “Amanda Undead” for her love of the eerie and morbid, shares the story of her career as a terror novelist whose eventual success gets sabotaged by the double misfortune of a romance with Steve (Jordan Coury) and a fascination with immortality. Brady shows an admirable sense of where to heighten the intensity between Amanda and Steve, and McGovern’s script offers a distinctive take on the irony of the infinite trap into which one walks willingly and only once.
Jordan Coury as Steve, Jocelyn Stoffel as Amanda in “Daughter of Horror” part of A WHISPER TO A SCREAM (Photo Nicole Brady)
The second show of the evening, Shoberg’s “A Sympathetic Ear,” places us late at night on a subway platform in New York City, where Jesse (Anthony Babeaux), attacked just a bit earlier outside a club called the “Artifice,” meets an impatient sophisticate named Arden (Luke Frederick). As the two men learn more of one another, their conversation engages questions of monstrosity, love and hate, and self-identity. Shoberg’s clever script and crisp direction allow Babeaux and Frederick the freedom to fashion exceptionally compelling performances.
Not surprisingly, the evening’s high-quality acting carries forward in Matthew Green’s “Quiet Tonight,” featuring Calvin Brookins and Mary-Cait Cox as Donnie and Lydia, unique caregivers faced with the terrifying problem of what will become of Lydia’s ailing sister, Michelle (Brady, offstage voice). When Brookins and Cox appear on stage together, do not wait for the ‘Burgh Vivant endorsement—get a ticket and go! McGovern directs with a superb understanding of creating suspense.
A second McGovern-authored effort, “Rosemary’s Rabies,” closes out the evening with an expressly imaginative piece that takes us from medical rooms to the otherworld and back again, all while rendering the feel of documentary cinema. Maddie Morgan delivers as Rosemary, a role that demands a performer of myriad talents. Trinity Griffin is categorically terrific (and unnerving) as Legion. Look too for nice turns by Peter J. Cofrancesco, Amara O’Donnell Neligh, and ‘Burgh Vivant contributor Joe Szalinski. And congratulations to the ever-delightful Pamela Cashdollar on her stage debut.
The production team for A Whisper. . .To A Scream merits the sincerest praise. Production Assistant Barb Sawatis and stage managers AB, Rachel Roach, and Gretchen Beck shepherd along an evening memorable for outstanding lighting (designed by Justin Ocepek-Sines) and sound (Britt Pierce, Roach, and Shoberg). Thank AB and Shoberg for their meticulous work on costumes, hair, and makeup. Samantha Lee Sanford and Shoberg deserve acknowledgement for special effects. Christopher Rone’s fight choreography impresses as well.
Halloween may have past, but the ghosts aren’t quite back in their graves, as the perambulatory spectre of Cecily Waugh (Susie Iannitelli) makes plain. To see her and other supernatural presences, visit the Haunted Theatre for a fun and chilling suite of short plays.
“A Whisper. . .To A Scream” plays through November 21 in the tell-tale heart of Bellevue at the Margaret Partee Performing Arts Center, 523 Lincoln Ave, Pittsburgh, PA 15202. For tickets and more information, visit here.
