adaptation of HP Lovecraft’s acclaimed horror stories ‘The Call of Cthulhu’.
The company joined with New College Performing Arts to work on
the plays over a four day period with a performance on Halloween night
itself! The actors had been cast weeks before and lines learnt. Quite a unique way of working as it is more usual to develop the roles as you go through rehearsals and try things out before committing the lines to memory. However, which such a short space of time to rehearse the actors had to rely on their instincts and bring characters into rehearsal. These instincts were all excellent one or two bits of tweaking but the groundwork had been done and it was just a case of pulling together to become an ‘ensemble’.
Lovecraft expert Laurence Clift was on hand to help with pronunciation of the tricky language which helped the actors. Creating the physical world of the story also gave the actors the opportunity to really test their movement skills and create abstract images which they did with great gusto!
By the beginning of the third day we were running the 45 minute performance admirably led by actor, Ashley Bates. Ashley was playing the investigator, the narrator in the adaptation that takes the audience on the mysterious journey through Cthulhu. Ashley had many complex monologues to learn and perform and he spent every waking moment of rehearsal getting to grips with his performance and the difficult fall into paranoia and madness that he had to portray.
The performance itself had a great atmosphere especially helped by Chris O’Brien’s lighting design which heightened the horror and mystery. The intimate thrust staging made it a real theatrical experience for the audience. Look for more Halloween shows from Whole Hog in the future…