Dracula Play Critique

Killian Wengler
Mr.Sysol
E-302
26 September 2012
Fine Arts Critique
Dracula
Are you into horror, drama and a good scare? If you answered yes then Dracula at Actors Theatre of Louisville is the play for you. The play was directed by William McNulty. This play was absolutely astonishing and I personally loved every minute of it. Dracula’s plot consists of a villainous vampire named Count Dracula and several brave men and women working together to try and defeat Dracula. The play is a summary of the events that take place leading up to the slaying of Dracula and also is about the slaying of Dracula. The play begins with a vampire attacking a young lady in the night and biting her. It then transitions to a man named Jonathan Harker in
a room. Harker’s fiance (Mina Murray) is sick with an incurable illness. Harker calls in an expert on supernatural occurrences named Van Helsing. Van Helsing has been studying vampires and looking for cases on it and as soon as he hears of the mysterious illness he almost instantly knows its due to a vampire attack. Before Van Helsing and Harker can really officially meet they are interrupted by an insane man named Renfield. Renfield comes in babbling about ridiculous things and then mentions seeing a creature in the night that was attacking Mina. Van Helsing then shows Renfield some pictures and his hypothesis of a vampire attack occurring is soon confirmed. The events that unfold after this point are very exciting, adventurous and spooky. The characters all decide to band together and go after Count Dracula to end his reign of terror once and for all. Some characters are lost in this quest. Others are successful in their tasks and survive to tell about the ordeal. If you wan to know what happens to the Count and the characters you’ll just have to go see this phenomenal production. You will probably admire the acting in this play. You can feel the emotions and fright coming out of the victims. You can also feel the horror and pain pour out of Dracula as he inflicts it on his victims. The actors did a good job of speaking loudly and clearly and also of using good body language. You felt like you were witnessing the events that occurred in the story first hand. The actors use of body language helped me to feel the emotions coming out of the actors. There were times in the play where body language helped the audience to really see how the character was feeling or show emphasis. The body language definitely contributed greatly to my overall satisfaction with the acting. Another great part of the acting was the way the actors spoke.
They projected their voices loudly and clearly. They also did a good job of speaking in certain tones that projected a certain feeling or emotion the character was going through to the audience. The excellent speaking definitely helped me to see just how talented the actors on stage were. There was no point in the production when I had even a slight problem hearing the characters. This is quite impressive because the auditorium was a decent size and I was sitting at an elevated level. One of the best parts of the acting was the use of props. The props were very realistic and all of the actions the props were used for improved the performance. Several times throughout the production props were used for very realistic effects such as shooting at the Count and killing vampires. Along with good acting the stage was awesome and made this horror story excellent. There were props all over and there even were some tree branches hanging above the seats that made you feel like you were actually in the action. Several times during the play smoke was used which was awesome. Also they used a lot of good lighting so that you didn’t miss anything important. Even though most of the time they used good lighting sometimes they used poor lighting when needed which also was great for effect when needed. One instance where poor lighting came in handy was when Dracula disappeared; I thought that was really
neat. Overall this play was absolutely great! I usually don’t like plays or theatre events, but I would definitely recommend this play to anyone looking for a good scare. The acting in the play was nearly flawless and no aspect of this play was anything less than what would be expected of a broadway level performance. The acting, lighting, use of props, etc. was great and it felt like you’re actually there in the story. This play isn’t for the faint of heart but is definitely great for horror lovers and I would recommend it to pretty much anyone who likes a good classic horror tale and a good scare.