Review: Dracula - Mina’s Reckoning
Festival Theatre, Edinburgh ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Brooding, occasionally languid and visually striking, much is familiar in Morna Pearson’s reworking of Bram Stoker’s Gothic masterpiece and yet much is unrecognisable.
The year is 1890 and in the Aberdeen Asylum For Women there’s a new arrival, the mysterious Mina and her collection of journals and papers.
Mina has a tale to tell and as she bewitches the inmates with her words they morph into the characters from her story, bringing to life the exploits of one particular member of the noble family, Dracula.
Centred on Mina’s close friendship with Lucy Westenra and their shared will to live their lives independent of male approval, love, repressed lust, repression and rebellion lie at the heart of this power-play.
As tenets of feminism mingle with tropes that will be all too recognisable to lovers of the horror genre, so it is a fractured adventure that unfolds, one that is at times a heightened feast, as gripping as it is chilling, while at others, one that is over earnest and, in a mercifully short second half, verges on self-indulgence.
That said, the production is directed with great pace and a choreographic touch by Sally Cookson, and performed by an eight-strong cast who give energetic performances on Kenneth Macleod’s inspired staging, a multi-levelled, exquisitely designed world of hidden exits and entrances.
This climbing frame of a set is animated to glorious effect by Aideen Malone’s inventive lighting and Lewis Den Hertog’s visceral projections. Together these components are quite mesmerising.
As is Liz Kettle’s Dracula, a graceful creature of the night who doesn’t so much walk as glide through the darkness, and at one point appears to float in the air. Kudos to movement director Vicky Manderson for that piece of magic.
Kettle chills, amuses and threatens in turn with a surprisingly endearing performance that pays its dues to the lurid horror films of yesteryear.
As Mina, Danielle Jam also gives a solid performance, as does Ros Watt in the role of the troubled Renfield, while Natalie Arle-Toyne has great fun as Van Helsing, giving a performance that parodies the finest over-playing traditions that put the ham into Hammer House of Horror.
Despite all there is to admire about this production, the writing ultimately lets it down, veering between melodrama, comedy and social comment. It can’t quite decide what it wants to be.
And when the message overrides the story, productions become lost, ensuring that in this case, everyone’s favourite vampire never really has enough to sink its teeth into even with a spectacular coup de theatre at its climax. It’s a scene that will live in the memory for a very long time.
Until 14 October
Tickets https://www.capitaltheatres.com/whats-on/all-shows/national-theatre-of-scotland-dracula-minas-reckoning/2109
Credit: Líam Rudden’s Must See Theatre