Let Them Call It Dramaturgy: Dracula @ Edfringe 2016

Dracula meets 39 Steps meets Black Adder in Let Them Call It Mischief’s variation of the classic story. 

Referencing suffragette movement and super food in one breath, this hilarious take on Dracula wonderfully represents the company’s playful and imaginative approach to all-time favourites.
Let Them Call It Mischief presents 
DRACULA
World premiere 
by Danny Wainwright and Daniel Hallissey
based on Bram Stoker’s original story
PRESS RELEASE FOR IMMEDIATE USE
We all know the Dracula story...or do we? 

1897. Join Count Dracula, the first Romanian immigrant, on his visit to England where he inadvertently strikes fear into the male establishment whilst seeking love in order to break his curse. Every minute is filled with dry humour, surprising twists, and downright silliness. Present is the undercurrent of the suffragette movement, as its powerful message begins to influence young female hearts. I have a cunning plan…

Cleverly fusing 19th century English gentry together with the modern world, Let Them Call It Mischief’s production is a funny and fast-paced retelling of a well-known Gothic tale, superbly portrayed by five actors taking on various characters. 

What was the inspiration for this performance?

The inspiration for this show was two-fold. Firstly, I was trying to find a good classic story to adapt into a comedy - as I'd done before with A Christmas Carol. Secondly, at the time I was reading Dracula (just one of the mountain of novels on my desk to read), Donald Trump had just begun his propaganda offensive and the parallels between him and the supposed heroes of the piece really became apparent. There's fear of the foreign, the unknown, anything that upsets the perceived wisdom - not the usual themes of a farcical comedy, but the ones we've gone for!

How did you go about gathering the team for it?

 Some of the team have worked together on a few shows and I knew that I wanted to have a couple of actors that I['d worked with before - and happily they wanted to work with me again. The rest is really scouring all of your contacts for people who have worked with other people and might like to work the same way as you do. We've got 2 actors who are new to the company as well as a new co-writer, designer and sound designer and they've all fitted in like they've always been here!

How did you become interested in making performance?

I think it's all about telling a story and entertaining people, at whatever level that is. For me, the best way I can tell a story is to get it out in front of an audience with some very talented people to help me, and to entertain those people. Being an actor and being in shows that didn't necessarily do either of those things really drove me on to be interested in making my own stuff.

Was your process typical of the way that you make a performance?

The writing part of the process has definitely changed for this one - mainly because of my co-writer Danny Hallissey. If anyone wants to learn about the structure of writing, he's the man to talk to! Once we have a draft - it's all about getting actors in to try it out. Actors are amazing at finding out what works and what doesn't work in the script. I can't stress enough how helpful actors are in bringing out the best in a piece of theatre and much of what is left has come from them. So apart from the initial writing stage, yes it has been fairly typical of our normal process: Get good people to help you make it better!

What do you hope that the audience will experience?

To be entertained for an hour. When you boil it all down, that's the essence of what we're trying to do. I'd love them to laugh a lot, have a think about some of the themes and issues of the piece, but if they come out of the theatre having had a good time for an hour, that'll do me.

What strategies did you consider towards shaping this audience experience?

I think there are a few strategies to put the audience at ease. We don't hide the fact that we're in a theatre, putting on a play in front of an audience. Once everyone's got that established, there's normally a good atmosphere for everyone to relax and have a good time.

Do you see your work within any particular tradition?

 I think there's a few traditions interwoven into what we do. Definite elements of farce, some clowning, some vaudeville, some satire and pastiche, and lots of others that we call upon on occasion. That said, I don't think we work within one tradition - just a mishmash of quite a few.

Known for their playful and imaginative approach to best-loved classics, Let Them Call It Mischief was founded in 2012 by Danny Wainwright, Stephanie Martin, Hilary Puxley, Flo Buckeridge and Tessa Gillett and has since produced four highly successful shows: The Alchemist at The White Bear in 2012, London Cuckolds in 2013, The Final Revelation of Sherlock Holmes, and A Christmas Carol in 2014, the latter three at the Pleasance Islington in London. 


Dracula will be the company’s fifth show and their Edinburgh Fringe debut. 

Self-pity

Magic Moments

by Niall Walker

Grant Smeaton as a saucy Cardinal (Cardinal Sinne @ Glasgay!)
Although Raymond Burke's script was either an extended skit or a pilot for a forthcoming BBC sit-com (and Sinne's helper Mrs Cavendish certainly had that overwrought widow vibe that would lend itself to playground popularity), it was Smeaton's ease as the titular cheeky cleric that gave Cardinal Sinne a period charm. The period was the 1970s, and Smeaton has a wry presence that Benny Hill would envy.

The Jackson Pollock Reveal (Colquhoun & McBryde @ Tron)
While John Byrne's script had many magic comedy moments, the tragic tale of the Scottish artists began to feel that an hour with those two drunks who catch the last 38 bus to Shawlands every weekend, but the sudden reveal of a Jackson Pollock canvas captured the excitement of Pollock's sudden appearance in the art world: the scale and ambition of his abstraction - as well as its clear imagery - dwarfs the haggling duo and lends context both to Pollock's success and their failure to move with the times. 

Jonathan Goddard climbs out of the window (Dracula @ Tramway)
Although Mark Bruce's vision seemed caught between ballet and visual theatre (long theoretical analysis to follow), it had plenty of magic moments. When Dracula dangles outside of his castle's window, falls to the ground and transforms from his sinister host into bloodthirsty monster mode, Bruce's choreography abandons the polite balletic technique to portray the anguish of the nightwalker. Hugging the tomb that maintains him, hurling himself across the stage and twisting across the dark Gothic scenery: Goddard is bestial, animalistic but retains a mysterious sensuality.

Hamlet as a family feud (The Drawer Boy @ Paisley Arts Centre)
Mull Theatre's fine, unpretentious production of the Canadian contemporary classic is a sensitive portrayal of how the arts can impact on real life (c), but when Miles, a slightly naive actor, explains the plot of Hamlet to the damaged Angus as if he lived the experiences of the psychotic prince, it is a wonderful moment that emphasises, for once, how Shakespeare's popularity rests not on his language but his ability to tell a good yarn. Since Michael Healey's script examines how theatre - a fiction -  can reflect the fictions of mundane life, this crucial scene opens the second act with a sly wink: it is as if Miles is deceitfully describing his own life, to mock Angus. However, James Mackenzie (Miles) and Alasdair McCrone (Angus) nail the intimate complicity between these two outsiders, and set up the mood for a second half of revelations and resolutions.

Andy Clark having a shave (Colquhoun & McBryde, Three Sisters both @ Tron)
Andy Arnold is pushing his luck to call two plays a season of John

Byrne plays, but the skill of Scotland's master author/artist is clear in the way he works the dour humour of Chekhov into a Scottish vernacular and revisits a lost history of art in his two-hander about Colquhoun and McBryde. But it is Andy Clark getting the magic moment this time. In Three Sisters, he is a bearded sailor, played with restraint and respect so that a potential philandering pratt becomes a noble, passionate romantic hero. By the time of Colquhoun & McBryde, he's got his beard off and his bohemian swagger on, making 'the straight man' in this comedy duo a thoughtful, if occasionally drunken, foil to Stephen Clyde's raging alcoholic life and soul of the party.  

Magic Moments... Made for Sharing

Here is my weekly list of five really cool things that I saw, heard or thought while I was about being a critic. Plus two rubbish ones, just from life, really.

The pas de deux between Mina and her husband (Dracula @Tramway). 

Another good bit(e)

Mark Bruce is big on the 'pas de deux equals people having sex' equation, and never more so than when Mina and Jonathan have their honeymoon night together. Capturing both characters' tentative intimacy, while establishing their sense of alienation even in the act of love, it encouraged the dancers to stretch themselves (literally and metaphorically) to present a sensual, hesitant union.  When the other characters came back on stage, it felt like they had barged into the bedroom. 

Guy Veale's soundscape (OOG @ The Arches).
Despite its reputation as a venue for alternative performance, The Arches is a tough space to work: the rumbling of trains overhead can be distracting. Veale's soundscape for Al Seed's exercise in physical precision was both tough enough to conquer the rumbles, and porous enough to incorporate them into the overall atmosphere. Switching between My Bloody Valentine, ambient (and probably illbient) numbers and a jaunty spot of old time jazz, Veale lent Seed's post-apocalyptic soldier an immersive, daunting dark atmosphere.

Putin's Photograph on the wall (Leviathan @ Glasgow Film Theatre).
A Russian take on The Book of Job was never likely to be a chuckle-fest, but the subtle pointers to the corruption of the ruling elite through Leviathan made it as much political satire as theodicy. In a key scene, when the corrupt mayor is confronted by the over-sexed lawyer (no-one is innocent in this film), a framed portrait of an anemic looking Putin is just above their heads throughout the scene, making it clear that evil is one thing that does work in trickle-down economic theory.

Victor Zarallo and Sophie Martin (Scottish Ballet Up Close @ Tramway).
At the risk of being another critic whom Sophie Martin has to arrange a restraining order, the brief pas de deux Jealousy by James Cousins in SB's mixed mixed bill was another reminder of how she is becoming one of the most exciting dancers in Scotland, meshing contemporary energy with classical technique. Bathed in red light, and teetering between the erotic and the despairing, Cousin's choreography gave both dancers a showcase that insists on ballet's ability to explore emotional extremes without compromising on its rigorous physicality.

The Words on the Body (Autumn Nerve Dance @ Old Hairdressers).
Paul  Michael Henry is always good for a bit of butoh inspired action, but Prof Lavery (academics - if you tell me, I'll steal it) pointed out a layer to this dance. Henry's use of projected cut-ups covered his body, emphasising the failure of words to express whatever Henry's movements were trying to manifest - but their disappearance left Henry's body bare and vulnerable. Not just some funky moves, Autumn Nerve Dance posed a question about how words might shape our identities, even if they are merely reflections on the surface of our bodies...

And here's the rubbish...

That Bloke In Front of Me (Autechre @ The Art School).
When he turned round and said in a loud voice that 'this was the most abstract thing ever made,' I wondered whether his comment on Autechre's electronic lesson in history (I'll get to it) was profound or just a stupid bit of showing off that revealed an ignorance of, say conceptual art  or Xenakis' compositions. I was pondering what he meant when he followed this up with 'and there is only one sound going on at a time', which was audibly wrong. 

Him wearing a comedy sanitary towel fancy dress on Halloween (Total Fucking Nightmare Walk Home @ Sauchiehall Street). 

The internet proves this is not an
isolated activity. Thanks, internet.

While it was a bold move to challenge the hegemony of the 'sexy' halloween fashions (I was more conservative and went for 'sexy William Burroughs), the man who was wearing a big bloody tampon wasn't committed enough to the feminist subtext to really pull it off. Actually, given that halloween is supposed to be about monsters (even 'sexy nurse' had a bit of blood on her - either because she was being top beat combo Nurse with Wound ((c) Lorna Irvine) or she'd cut herself on her nasal accent), wearing a towel suggests an innate fear of menstruation. 

There is, of course, another joke about where these towels are usually found, and what this makes him, but I think that's going into misogynistic territory. 

Mad Cyril gets called in the office.

"Ah, Mr Cyril. Thank you so much for coming in. We appreciate you are a busy man, but we felt that it might be worth your time if we could clarify some of your turns of phrase in your latest review."

"So whatcha lookin fer, sunshine?"

"Well, of course, we aren't trying to censor your work, but some of your expressions might not be appropriate in this particular context."

"Ya talkin baht my wun on Dracla?"

"Exactly, yes. If we could just have a look at this description of the final pas de deux."

Dracla mincin abaht like a nonce...

"Obviously, you are describing the quality of his movement when he dances in joy at what he believes to be the return of Mina, the woman he loves."

"Ee's pleased awright, but there's no need fer all that scamperin ee does."

"You feel that, choreographically, the interpretation of Dracula fails to express masculinity?"

"Too right, guvner. We've seen im havin it with four bad boys in the previous scene, and creepin abaht all shoulders unched up as ee gives that slutty number the bite: wun time he climbs right awt the winda and hugs the erth, kinda like ee's connected to it and that, nice spot of contemporary action, all twisted and evil, like. 

But as soon as he starts up on the bally, it's like ee's a bit light in the loafers."

"You see, it is this language that could be read as homophobic."

"Yeh, right. Urling abuse at a man for is sexuality is wun fing, but Ah'm talkin baht a fictional character oos physical vocabulary is inconsistent.Ya sayin that ain't kosha, son?"

"I think the language is offensive, yes."

"But it gets tha point across, right?"

"So, Mr Cyril, what you are saying is: if a fictional critical persona expresses an opinion about a fictional character in a performance, it is acceptable to use language that, if said by a real person to another real personal would be beyond social acceptability."

"Homofobic abuse is well out of order, if it's real people. Ah'm not sayin the geeza who danced Dracla was good wiv is interior design. Ee probably gets loads of blart, with that body. Ee'd probably turn me afta a coupla pints."

"I don't think you are taking the impact of words seriously enough, Mr Cyril."

"Oy, oy, really? Wanna get sucked inta Cyril's past, do ya? There are fings wot you don't wanna know."

"Your fictional biography gives us a clue to why you find using abusive language appropriate for criticism?"

"When I woz a boy, Ah wanted ta be a dancah, like that Neuryeff. Fought ee would ave to bash em off wiv a shitty stick. Only my movver made me wear tights to class, and the ova lads caught sight of me old down-belows. Ah ad a lot ta prove. Thas why Ah have a rep for frowing dustbins frew glass windas, sunbeam."

"Are you arguing that your experience permits offensive language."

"Nah, I arguing that Mark Bruce's choreography is inconsistent and fails to realise dance's potential for expressing the character of a vampire, innit."

"But the association of ballet with male homosexuality..."

"Is somefin Ahve lived frew, mate. Iss a mif, anyway. Barry Shikov was a it wiv tha ladies - ee got ta pump that bird off Sex in the City."

"Sex and the City, and that was fictional too."

"Ya wanna read abaht my boy Barry before ya challenge me, chuckles. Maffew Bourne's swans off Swan Lake  were pretty bad-ass, and they were all about the man-love. So omosexuality isn't the same as effeminancy, an there's plenty ov examples of horn-dog lads in the ballet."

"But is Mark Bruce a ballet choreographer?"

"Annuver question fer annuver time. But if Ah'm pondering the quality of the extensions and rememberin the sexy stylings of MacMillan every time they do a pas de deux, it's ballet awright."

"Despite this, you are happy with the three star rating you've awarded the show?"

"Yeh. I dunno why you ad to give it all this about one frase, though. Seems a lot ov work for not much."

"We have examined the use of language in artistic contexts, explored the relationship of choreography to movement and considered the importance of identifying the difference between performance and artist - all in a dialectical format."

Last Chance Saloon presents DRACULA: SEX, SUCKING & STARDOM

I recently saw Philip Glass performing his soundtrack to the classic Dracula film - the one that is all the more scary because it looks like an documentary - and didn't like it. I love Philip Glass, and was really excited at watching him perform. The thing was, it just felt like Glass had decided that his style of minimalism was bigger than the film, and slapped some generic riffs over the poignant, the kitsch and the frightening scenes. I didn't shit my pants, which is what I would have expected. Next time, they ought to let Kode9 have a pop at it. I bet he knows how to pitch a Brown Night. 


However, Last Chance Saloon are probably not looking for bowel leakage in their version of Dracula. Apparently, their Count loves some Lloyd Weber. So I won't be weeping when he gets the Big Stake in the end. Since I have no idea about musicals, and there's some Lady Gaga jokes too, I sat back and let the company tell me about it.


What will make your show stand out at the Fringe in 2012?

Three hunky men, a very liberal take on Lady Gaga's Bad Romance, and lots of blood. 

How would you describe the piece - what sort of theatre is it, and what inspired the content?

We make what we like to call Guilty Pleasure Theatre, that is, theatre that's sole purpose is to put a smile on your face. Last Chance Saloon aren't here to educate you- we want the audience to forget about their woes and their bad day at work, and indulge in a ruddy good laugh.

Dracula is the perfect story for the kind of theatre we make, with an instantly recognisable hero we could easily parody. He's a classic villain but we see him as a bit lonely, misunderstood and rather camp! Poor Old Count, in our version he's a secret Michael Buble groupie and a wannabe West End star!  Vampires are having a real moment, thanks toTwilight et al, and we hope our show will appeal both to Robert Pattison fans- and to those seeking an antidote to vampires that sparkle.  

How long have you been working in theatre, and are there any highlights of your career so far?

We spent 3 years at Drama School together and graduated 7 years ago. The highlight of my career was definitely putting on Dracula: Sex, Sucking & Stardom at The Hen & Chickens. It was quite unlike anything we'd done previously and we had no idea how it would turn out, but the pride you get from producing your own work, playing to packed houses and receiving fantastic feedback from people who you trust cannot be matched. 

Why did you decide to come to the Fringe?

As an actor in the industry you quickly realise how much of a small cog in the machine you are and how little control you have over your lives. Forming Last Chance Saloon and writing shows  for ourselves was a way of wrestling back the creative control and allowing us to do what we set out to do at the start of our acting careers, namely, perform work we believe in with people we respect.

Paradise in the Vault 
4 & 5 Aug, 9.20pm; 6 – 27 Aug, 8.40pm (No shows 13, 20)