THE
CREATURE CREEPS
Little
Baddow Drama Club
at
the
Memorial Hall
20.11.2014
This
Gothic comedy was penned back in '77 by Jack Sharkey, onetime jokes
editor of Playboy.
“Dreadful
is a relative term”, and his often clever spoof of the
Transylvanian
genre has many witty touches, and is amusingly self-referential. But
it runs out of comedy steam a little towards the end, as the
characters sit around listening to explanations of what's been afoot.
Director
Kenton Church [who also dresses up to play the various Shtunken
brothers] has
assembled an excellent cast, including some stalwarts and several
new faces. The range of accents is breathtaking. We're in the
Carpathians, I think, but there are Americans, including
the daughter of the Home Counties Baroness and her Mad Scientist
spouse.
The
piece really needs brazen, bold performances, and some actors achieve
this better than others here. Peter White is excellent as the
deformed Mord, as is Sylvia Lanz as the prim Teutonic housekeeper,
knocking back tots of schnapps.
John
Peregrine is the mysterious von Blitzen, with Rita Ronn as an
imposing grande dame [beautifully turned out, as are many of the
women characters]. The youthful US contingent is
well
handled by Sarah Trippett-Jones, Heather Lucas and James Oakley.
The
sound effects [phonograph horns high on the castle walls] are
brilliantly done in the manner of steam radio,
and the set, with its tiny fenestrals
affording a glimpse of figures on the stairs, magically makes this
tiny stage into a cavernous baronial hall.
