It’s may be almost 170
years since Gothic literature writer Edgar Allan Poe died under mysterious
circumstances but in Broad Encounters immersive theatre production A
Midnight Visit, he is brought back to life and entice his audience to face their
fears in an evening of macabre entertainment. Audiences are left to wander
through the maze of 36 rooms as they come across various figures from Poe’s
life, characters from his stories and even the writer himself. What happens
next depends on the path you choose to take.
We are initially greeted by an undertaker who prepares us for
entry into an unpredictable and macabre dream world. With surgical masks over
our faces to prevent us contracting any diseases (and to add to the unsettling
anonymity of the evening) we begin our journey into the dark recesses of the
mind. As many scenes play out simultaneously in this labyrinth, it is
impossible to see everything unfold. This makes it difficult to piece together
a structured narrative but choosing to see the evening as a series of vignettes
taken from Poe's life and his writing, heightens the unease permeating
throughout the production and allows you to focus solely on what is
happening.
Using Edgar Allan Poe’s short story Shadow – a Parable as its inspiration, experimental theatre artist and stage designer House of Vnholy's SEER is an immersive exploration of darkness and silence and a study on being alone. Performed as part of the Next Wave Festival, this site-specific show at the Darebin Arts Centre combines ritual and poetry to encourage us to consider not only our life and our death but also the part in between.
The most powerful part of SEER takes place inside the main theatre of the Darebin Arts
Centre where you took a seat in a specially designed booth facing
the stage. There was something very eerie about being the only
person in a theatre that can seat almost 400 people. I constantly felt like figures were emerging from the stage, standing up from the seats and staring at me through the darkness. No doubt the haunting soundscape designed by Jannah Quill contributed to this disorientation, and along with the light images being projected onto the stage, I was continually questioning if I was experiencing a painful death or an uplifting rebirth.
