The scary show worth seeing this weekend
PaperHouse Theatre often invites audiences to do more than watch the action. Generally, audiences become part of the play.
The theater company, led by Nicia Carla, stages all its productions at FROCK Shop in Plaza Midwood, the turn-of-the-last-century home on Central Ave. that can be equally effective as an English country estate (the role the house played last year in “A Woman of No Importance”) or a remote and slightly spooky mansion that’s home to a lonely mother and daughter.
Carla uses the house as a character in the plays she produces and directs there and looks for material suitable to the historic home. “I read a few scripts that were just not right for us and then got the idea to adapt something ourselves,” she said. “So I began searching for stories from [the late 1800s], and ‘Carmilla’ jumped into my lap.”
“Romantic vampire thriller” is how Carla characterizes the play she was happy to stumble on. The basic summary is this: Laura lives with her mother in a remote mansion. (Doesn’t it sound spooky already?) They take in an unexpected visitor, Carmilla, with whom Laura becomes fascinated.
Meanwhile, girls in the nearby village are dying of a mysterious illness, and Laura is plagued by night visions. Are they nightmares? Or something more sinister?
“I listened to it on a road trip this summer,” Carla said, “and thought, wow, how have I never heard of ‘Carmilla?’ This is an exciting, sensual vampire story with female protagonists that predates Bram Stoker’s ‘Dracula’ [by 26 years]. Where has it been hiding?”
Regardless, she has adapted the story into her new play, “She Who Watches,” in which the scares are less obvious than those in a teen slasher flick.
You may get the willies, but it won’t be from fake blood or an Addams Family-style dismembered hand. “The scariest things are what we imagine,” Carla said. “At FROCK Shop, we are letting the night and the story take care of the spooky.”
This time around, the audience won’t participate in a group dance or wear masks to a Shakespearean mid-summer night’s ball. (Audiences have done both with PaperHouse.)
“The audience will take the more traditional role of spectator,” Carla said. “No one gets grabbed or assumes a role in the story.”
Audiences can interact with a fortuneteller during a brief intermission, though. It wouldn’t be PaperHouse-style experiential theater without something like that.
House as character
It will be getting dark when audiences pull into the old Charles W. Parker House, which the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Landmarks Commission has called “one of the [city’s] finest local examples of the Four Square style.”
Historian Tom Hanchett has written for The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Landmarks Commission, “The Four Square house type developed as part of a general movement around the beginning of the 20th century toward more simple and sensible, non-eclectic, rectangular houses – a reaction against the gaudy, chaotic Victorian era.”
Although, Hanchett notes later, “The house is flanked by a pair of massive brick chimneys. Their elaborate paneling and corbelled caps are among Charlotte’s most exuberant, an unexpectedly Victorian feature on this otherwise post-Victorian house.”
The house is essential to the action of the play. In fact, Carla compares the play to the eerie Nicole Kidman movie, “The Others,” in which nearly every minute of the action takes place within the walls of the home. But she promises “occasional laughs sprinkled in.”
“We are letting the beauty of the house and the dark guide us,” she said.
The play
As for who the play is right for, Carla said, “Anyone who likes vampires, spooky stories and romance gone wrong – with a dash of comedy for added flavor” should enjoy “She Who Watches.” It is recommended for ages 16 and up.
PaperHouse theatrical experiences are always something of a party, and “She Who Watches” is no exception. Mulled wine, tea and cider wassail, warm rum spiced cider, sausage balls and pumpkin muffins with cream cheese frosting are the party libations and nibbles offered this time.
While being this close to the action is exciting for the audience, it can be a distraction for actors. Carla has advised her cast (Racquel Williams as Laura, Sarah Woldum as Carmilla, Andrea King as Mother and Rebecca Costas as the Countess) that focus is essential.
They have to shift from what Carla calls “living in the moment of the scene” (where they’re acting) to guiding the audience forward to the next scene (where they are almost ushers).
Climbing the imposing staircase inside FROCK Shop is one part of “She Who Watches,” so audience members need to feel comfortable getting up and down stairs. The audience will be rewarded for the climb. “The room upstairs is much smaller, and it gives us a chance for an intimate moment that extends the feeling you are in the world of these characters, an unseen observer,” Carla said.
Tickets are $30 and available online. The Gothic vampire play runs at FROCK Shop (901 Central Ave.) Oct. 13-16, Oct. 20-23 and Oct. 27-30. All shows are at 8 p.m. Seating is limited. Only 30 tickets are available for each performance.
For more on FROCK Shop, visit www.frockrevival.com. Learn more about PaperHouse here.
Photos: George Hendricks
This story was originally published October 13, 2016 at 10:28 PM with the headline "The scary show worth seeing this weekend."