An isolated country manor house surrounded by suffocating woods. A main protagonist clad in a tailcoat and flowing shirt. You’d be forgiven for thinking you’ve been plunged into the middle of a classic Gothic horror, but all is not as it seems in Tim Foley’s It Walks Around The House at Night. While clearly influenced by M.R. James and Sheridan LeFanu, its most obvious inspiration is Susan Hill’s modern Gothic classic The Woman in Black. While Hill’s work is firmly set in the Edwardian era, Foley has created a present-day masterpiece filled with all the creeping dread and pervasive sense of doom of the very best Horrors.
Wanna-be actor and current bar worker Joe (George Naylor) is given an offer he can’t possibly refuse by a charismatic stranger, an acting role, albeit a rather unusual one. For five days and a few (much-needed) thousand pounds, will he play a ghost? One who stalks around the grounds of the manor house in the dead of night – just to frighten the nieces of the charming stranger. So far, so straight forward, until the reality proves to be a bone-chilling nightmare he could never have predicted.
It Walks Around The House at Night is the perfect simmering stew of ingredients to spook. A script that twists and turns like a roller coaster, clever humour, an appealing protagonist and enough jump scares and spine-chilling surprises to keep the audience engaged throughout. It lures you in from the start and keeps you gripped to the end. All of this combined with Neil Bettles and Tom Robbins masterful and innovative but minimal set, atmospheric lighting and video design by Joshua Pharo and Pete Malkin’s perfectly pitched soundscape, makes for a stand-out theatrical experience.
At its heart a pure Gothic chiller, but just below the surface it does provoke thought on class and just what we are willing to do for money when all our options are exhausted.
The plays greatest asset is its leading man, on whose shoulders the weight of the piece rests, George Naylor delivers a tour-de-force performance that has us rooting for him throughout.
In It Walks Around The House at Night, Tim Foley has pulled off the fabulous feat of delivering a thoroughly old-fashioned modern horror story – unmissable.