“Why is Shelly in the audience? I had her hanging from a noose,” Christopher Lynn, one of the three costume designers for “Dracula: the Musical?” is referring to the white-wigged skeleton reclined in one of the mahogany seats of the theater. Shelly fits in with the gothic atmosphere of the set, flawlessly designed by Gwen Arnold.
Past the entrance is a piano adorned with delightfully macabre decorations like shrunken heads and tarantulas. Spider webs cascade across banisters. Golden chandeliers hang from the ceiling, looming over the audience. This is not even the stage, which can best be described as what would happen if Martha Stewart and Jack the Ripper designed a room together, and as an added bonus, its construction was faithfully based on the script by playwright Rick Abbot.
Abbot’s play is set in 19th century England, and it tells the tale of a quirky family consisting of Dr. Seward (Dennis Loy), who is the tactful head of the madhouse adjoining his own home, his tipsy wife Sophie (Tracey Dalton Mercier), his lovelorn daughter Mina (Arminda Bowlin), who is awaiting the return of her missing-in-action fianc, his short-tempered maid Nelly (Tracy Simmons), and his insect-slurping patient Boris Renfield (Michael Reese Wheeler).
Accompanying the Seward’s for the night are voluptuous actress Bubu Badoop (Pria E. Paranthaman) and Dr. Van Helsing (Chris McVey), who cannot seem to convince his oblivious friends that their new neighbor is a bloodsucking vampire, the infamous Dracula (Grant Simmons).
Plot summary aside, I enjoyed both the rehearsal and the Friday the 13th showing. The play, in its entirety, is a comical and very professional piece with appropriate humor for all ages.
Each character displayed nearly perfect timing and delivery of humorous lines, and knew how to keep an audience entertained.
The music is a personal favorite of mine, and fellow horror fanatics will shriek with delight at the sound of each song brought to the mix by first-time music director Meglyn Deel.
With a 15-minute inter-mission, the play was roughly an hour long and the antics of each character on stage made the hour go by all too quickly.

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