Nordo Muses: The Witching Hour
I love picking a genre or a class or an aspect of culture and putting it through the ringer whether I like it or not. Nothing is above a good joke. And so, while I may - like a good Wiccan - prefer my dates written as if Halloween were the beginning of the year, or have crystals for protection beside my cat’s water bowl, I loved putting it all on its head for our 2018 show The Witching Hour. The entire point was to expose the humor behind a person who believes in runes (Viking runes, Norse runes, all the runes!) tarot card decks, and casting spells, throw in a little truth lurking behind the supernatural, and toss it in a salad.
Which is all to say when years later we were brainstorming what would
become our next Room Service Experience, there was no doubt in our minds:
The Witching Hour, baby! I immediately thought of Ronnie Hill’s performance as Head Adept and Magician of the Dark Arts, William Wescott, a character as learned and
scholarly as he is bad at magic. Of course we thought of our beautiful monsters based on the human fears. I particularly thought of the Fear of Loneliness, so hauntingly portrayed by one of my favorite actors in town, Tatiana Pavela, with a stunning costume design by Fantasia Rose and Indira Shlag. I couldn’t WAIT to pull that sucker out of the plastic bin that has been hanging out in our storage space and put Tatiana back in that perfect witchy makeup.
But most of all, I thought of crystals, and candles, and spells. I thought about delivering my ideal date night, where velvet bags are opened over craft cocktails, and spells cast one by one to reveal a story about the human condition. And savory pie. And monster comedies. (Mon-Coms for the Buffy the Vampire Slayer fans.)
Plus, it’s fun to watch actors play a human in one Act and the monster that represents their deepest Fear the next. So we’re bringing it back, and to get us all in the mood for the cursed and strange, we thought we’d share our Nordo’s Musings from the original show:
Watch:
Clue - First one guest, then another, and another until we have a colorful mob of personalities that don’t care one whit about one another as they chase the MacGuffin. What’s a better way to start a tale on a dark and stormy night.
The Witches of Eastwick - Well, when a bunch of witches decided to summon the devil, and then they have to deal with the consequences. It’s classic. It’s the crux of so many dramas. And a few comedies.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer - The supernatural never landed so squarely in camp so well. Throw in the troubles of adolescence, the problems with public education, and a mandate the save the world from demons and vampires and you have a cultural hit.
Read:
Ray Bradbury short stories from “Quicker than the Eye” and “October Country”- These stories were not read for the comedy but for the unfettered strange worlds that he opened up in his writing. He touched ghosts and alternate worlds and twisted timelines and most notably brought Science Fiction into the mainstream.
“The Ocean at the End of the Lane” by Neil Gaiman- Monsters. Monsters. Monsters. And the most excellent telling of monsters just down the road that anyone has attempted to do. Clean fantasy.
“Practical Demonkeeping” by Christopher Moore- I find comedy a hard thing to do in novels. The gimmick invariably gets old I think, and the same joke just goes on forever. Even the famed Hitchhiker’s Guide to Galaxy Trilogy got a bit old on books 4 & 5. (Don’t let Douglas Adams hear that I said that.) And well, Lamb by Christopher Moore may be just one of the best comedies in novel form there is. But that was about the life of Jesus or his best friend, and I needed a comedy about monsters so I hit up this one. It’s good. Not Lamb. But good.
“Gothic Grimoire” by Konstantinos- This started the whole thing really. Wandering around a New Age crystal shop, thumbing through the literature looking for themes and situations to use, I found this dark gem of spells from New York City. Self-help sublimely smashes into the dark arts.
Wander in New Age crystal shop and peruse books when you can wander a New Age crystal shop again.
Listen:
“Black Hole Sun” by Soundgarden
“Gold Dust Woman” by Fleetwood Mac
“Life On Mars” by David Bowie. Always listen to David Bowie. Please.
Fact:
According to books on the properties of stones, meteorite does help a person speak to aliens. Also, the “Gothic Grimoire” is a real book written by a real person named Konstantinos who lives in New York City and likes Gothic chanting. It says so on the back.