Feelgood Theatre Productions are celebrating their 25th anniversary of award-winning, outdoor productions. Their mission statement is ‘to produce a genuine fusion of music, story and site-specific theatre with five star production values and community in perfect balance ‘ and that they do - with aplomb. Artistic Director Caroline Clegg’s vision and creativity has a terrific synergy with the text and the beauty of Heaton Park as she brings the audience an immersive and reimagined Dracula to Heaton Hall and its beautiful (and at times spooky) surroundings. The book has been written to match and exploit the settings by Peter Clifford with some nice tips of the hat to time and place in the dialogue.
I attended the previous Feelgood production of Dracula in 2005 and was voted ‘most wanted to see again’ by its audiences. I had found it most memorable; particularly where their Dracula had ridden, dramatically, over the crest of a hill on a black stallion; just as the light changed and so had high expectations for this new production. It did not disappoint. The director had managed to find new mileage and unexpected surprises with a stellar cast who created the light and spooky shade in abundance as we traversed the famous story, illustrated through comedic touches, pathos and notably music to breathe an eery, undead life into Stoker’s text.
If you’re unfamiliar with this theatre style, the audience in simple terms, follows the action, on foot to different settings, outside mostly with no artificial amplification of sound and only basic lighting to create effects necessary for the action. The technical team and cast must have been extremely challenged last night on the hottest day of the year, running through the trees from set to set as director Caroline Clegg guided the audience as a narrating 'Lady of the Manor' .
The action began with a prologue of an annual, gypsy festival at Heaton Hall. Year 1899. Bringing the original story to Heaton where youthful ingénue Lucy Harker and the more reserved Mina Seward were caught up in the excitement of the gypsies’ arrival. Young, local schoolgirls from the Co-op Academy played ensemble, gypsy girls and vampires with maturity and enthusiasm as they had a difficult scene, dancing and singing folk songs in a foreign tongue and engaging with the cold audience. They read palms confidently and kept in character and led us into the story nicely. The key characters were then introduced: the police inspector, Edward Morris, played by Joseph Jordan who had a great presence and a resonating voice and a very watchable persona. This led into the historical hall itself where the seated audience watched Mina’s 21st birthday celebrations as she received the mysterious gift of a brooch and a poem written in a strange tongue. We were treated to some lovely interplay between the lively Lucy Harker (Frederica Davies) who gave a playful and capricious characterisation as the more worldly-wise, amusingly irritating, friend and counterpoint for the heroine Mina Seward (Sophie Coward). Their scene was right on point: contemporary, whilst being true to it's origins of female role and expectations. Coward’s and Davies’s musicality shone through the entire production and was a real highlight; from parlour flute playing and classical singing through to their hypnotised, vampirish, melodious wailings and incantations. I loved it!
The girls are seduced into attending the dancing at the gypsy fair by the mysterious and deliberately confusing Christina (Rebecca Phythian), another voice of note throughout the evening. Her hypnotic movement as she spied on the proceedings on behalf of the Count, was impish and hobgoblinesque which created an underscore of threat. Phythian has immense presence and I couldn’t take my eyes off her. Her crazed scene in Transylvania where she offered to show only Van Helsing where Dracula lies, luring him in, was feverishly captivating.
Dracula’s entrance at the end of Act 1 had great impact. Peter Clifford’s physical presence was scary enough without any action. He was more Dracula than Peter Cushing for me. Sinister, statuesque, eyes that bored into my soul and a deep, chilling voice. This is all before he showed us his trump card. As a professional magician, the actor pulled off a disappearing act that left myself and my son gasping. I won’t spoil it for you but that alone should be worth the ticket price. A truly believable performance.
Van Helsing, the hero of the piece; avenging the murder of his family and carrying out a legacy, was played with gravitas and presence by Karl Greenwood. The killing of the vampires was in safe and secure hands with him at the stake. Other key performances were Mina’s mother, ( Dr) Joan Seward a very enjoyable characterisation by Elianne Byrne of strength and stoic determination as she assisted the inspector in hunting the killer. On her first entrance, I struggled with the relative ages of Joan and Mina as mother and daughter but I was soon drawn into her acting and this disappeared. The Inspector (Joseph Jordan) was a great foil for Mina’s mother and as a would-be suitor for Lucy was lured to his demise by her vampire siren form. Lucy’s brother, who is the reason Dracula comes to UK shores, Jonathan Harker (Harry Mace) had a bumbling amiability and a naivety which made me want to shake his inept public school boy persona.. after all, it was all his fault! The Heaton Hall’s housemaid, Charlotte, was played with warm, northern comedy by Helena Fox who reminded me of Coronation Street’s, Hayley. She was a joy to watch and a delightful comic turn due to her slight physicality and cookie characterisation. Lastly, the King Of The Gypsies, Apostolo Lupuroso was provided for by an enigmatic performance by Dan Willis. I had to check in my programme to see if all that hair was his. What a great wig! He was a true Gypsy King with swagger and a dark, simmering character of mysterious depths who played the hunters off in a surprising plot twist.
This was a memorable production due to the key things that make Feelgood do exactly that: the setting was unique, it creatively used spaces, time and light to great effect. The director had drawn out unique, well-observed performances which used her actors’ individual talents and abilities to a very high standard and the music was just sublime which really highlighted something that I’d forgotten about: the thing that used to scare me, most of all, when watching horror movies of this ilk, when young, wasn’t just the acting - it was the music .
Get a ticket whilst you still can. Take a blanket or a deckchair and have a completely different night at the theatre.
Reviewer - Kathryn Gorton
on - 25/7/19
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