MARTY
ROSS – ONE MAN HALLOWEEN
London
Horror Festival, Etcetera Theatre 2nd – 4thNovember 2012.
Halloween
is fast approaching – the season for an onslaught of CGI-heavy horror
blockbusters at the multiplex, all night marathons of previous blockbusters on
DVD and cable, shops full of designer horror masks etc. etc. But what about
getting back to the basics of this ancient Celtic festival: the low-tech art of
a traditional Celtic storyteller standing before his audience of an autumn
night and purely, simply, spinning yarns of ghostly and terrifying
things… and with such expressive force that every listener’s imagination is
filled with images no CGI could match?
That,
in a nutshell, is what will be happening from 2nd to 4th of November
at the Etcetera Theatre, Camden, as part of the London Horror Festival, when
Scottish storyteller Marty Ross will be presenting his show “One Man
Halloween”, telling a separate full-length story on each of the three nights.
Ross
has established himself as a dramatist, with particular emphasis on the horror
genre, by way of stage drama performed in London, Liverpool, Glasgow and
Edinburgh, but primarily with extensive work for BBC radio, including the
serials ‘Ghost Zone’ and ‘Catch My Breath’ and the Radio 4 series ‘The Darker
Side Of The Border’. Most recently, 2012’s ‘Rough Magick’ threw William
Shakespeare into the embrace of highland witchcraft. He has also written audio
drama for Big Finish’s Doctor Who series: “Night’s Black Agents” and the
Lovecraftian “The Lurkers At Sunlight’s Edge” – as well as the Dark
Shadows drama “Dress Me In Dark Dreams”, which took a more serious approach to
the reinvention of the US gothic drama than Tim Burton’s film, released at the
same time. Also this year, “Blood and Stone”, based on the legend of
bloody Countess Elizabeth Bathory, was nominated for a 2012 Rondo
Award (horror fandom’s Oscars).
But the
more ancient art of pure, ‘unplugged’ storytelling has always been close to his
heart, dating back to when – in the early days of his writing career – he
would eke out his literary income by working as a guide on walking
holidays, telling eerie folktales on the tops of mountains, the
better to give hikers time to get their breath back! Thus his first
performances took place not in theatres but on mountains and moors from
Scotland and Irelandto Austria and, in Germany, the witch-haunted Harz
mountains, home of Walpurgisnacht. But he has also performed in pubs,
libraries, anywhere he can stand up and make a spectacle of himself. For Ross is
a one man theatre company – he doesn’t sit in a comfy chair and recite from a
book… no, Ross’s storytelling is full-tilt expressionist theatre,
involving multiple characterisations, dramatic movement and gesture,
often music too (he thumps a mean bodhran drum!).
His
repertoire includes traditional folktales (often with his own modifications),
retellings of classics by the likes of Poe, Stevenson and MR James, and his own
original stories. The three stories he will be performing at the Etcetera
exemplify this. On 2nd. November, he will perform RANNOCH, an original
story drawing on his experience guiding hikers across the highland moor of
the title and at the scene of the battle of Culloden, in
thebloody aftermath of which his tale is set. But this is
no cosy period ghost story… as a tale of a war of conquest and its troubled
aftermath, it has more contemporary resonance. On 3rd. November, he takes
temporary leave of Scotland to emphasise the expressionist aspects of his
theatre, with a one man version of one of the classics of expressionism in YOU
MUST BECOME CALIGARI!, a blackly comic, but also poignant,reinvention
of ‘The Cabinet Of Doctor Caligari’, casting all kinds of interesting new
lights on the material. On the last night, 4th. November, DRIFTWOOD HEARTS
takes one of the eeriest of all traditional Scottish folktales, usually
known as ‘The Haunted Ships’, but updates it to modern times, using
the sketchy plot of the original as a springboard for much macabre
and darkly romantic invention of Ross’s own.
Useful
links:
London
Horror Festival: http://www.londonhorrorfestival.com/whats-on/one-man-halloween/
Blood
And Stone (play): http://www.wirelesstheatrecompany.co.uk/index.php/paid-downloads-radio-theatre/view_document/8-blood-and-stone--3d-thriller
Medusa
On The Beach (play):
Dark
Shadows: Dress Me In Dark Dreams: http://www.bigfinish.com/releases/v/dress-me-in-dark-dreams-729
Doctor
Who: The Lurkers At Sunlight’s Edge: http://www.bigfinish.com/releases/v/dress-me-in-dark-dreams-729
Doctor
Who: Night’s Black Agents:
Rough
Magick (BBC play):
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