21st.
CENTURY POE: FALLING FOR THE USHERS
No.
28 Belper, Market Square, Belper. Saturday 28th.
February 2015. 7.30 pm.
Tickets
£7 / £5 concession.
Scottish
storyteller & playwright Marty Ross (BBC Radio horror; Doctor Who
audio) drags The Fall Of The House Of Usher kicking & screaming
into the modern world, in a show already a hit at the Edinburgh
Fringe & London Horror Festivals!
Edgar
Allan Poe's The Fall Of The House Of Usher is long-established as a
classic horror tale, but Marty Ross is a ‘modernist’ on the live
storytelling scene, keen to rescue this resurgent form from backward
looking quaintness. Thus, in his version, Falling For The Ushers,
haunted twins Roderick and Madeline Usher have left behind the misty
Gothic manor of the original story to become superstars of Glasgow's
contemporary art world, thanks to their macabre conceptual
installations in the manner of Damien Hirst and the Chapman Bros. But
when Madeline’s old art school admirer Ed shows up, their tragic
downfall is as inescapable as ever. And Marty Ross's unique
performing style, combining evocative language with expressionistic
mime and gesture, makes full-blown theatre out of the story as he
embodies a whole cast
list of larger than life characters.
FALLING FOR THE USHERS
has already been a hit at the Edinburgh Fringe and London Horror
Festivals, as testified by the reviews it received:
“Insanely
good storytelling… a master craftsman who never turns down the
pressure… Ross’ violently impressive performance make this a
heart-pounding triumph… Trainspotting meets gothic horror….” –
Broadway Baby *****
“…What
Marty Ross does with literature’s most mystical and macabre works
is make them sing with new energy and beguile an audience all over
again…. poetically re-worked ‘The Fall of the House of Usher’
manages, in its modernisation, to preserve and revere the original,
even intensifying its impact… a bewitchingly good story that leaves
a haunting reminder long after the lights have gone down.” - 3
Weeks ****
“Ross
has a great aptitude for suspense and terror, and he hurls himself
into his tale with energy and passion, in words which ring with
Glasgow rhythm. An accomplished piece of work… a chilling
conclusion.” – The Scotsman
“Visceral.
A compelling narrator and onstage presence. … left you thinking as
well as reeling… theatre that kept you on edge… an immensely
entertaining ride that scared and shocked in equal measure – a fair
ground ghost ride for the 21st Century….” – Fringe Review
Well established as a
playwright, particularly with dark drama for BBC radio (Ghost Zone,
Catch My Breath, Darker Side Of The Border, Rough Magick & Lady
Macbeth Of Mtsensk; another Poe show, Moyamensing, is to be BBC Radio
Scotland's big Halloween show this year, with another new play, The
Dead Of Fenwick Moor, to be broadcast in the new year), plus Doctor
Who & award-nominated Dark Shadows audio drama, as well as Blood
And Stone, nominated for a 2012 Rondo Award (horror fandom’s
Oscars), Ross also regularly performs as a live storyteller,
particularly in Scotland, his native country, and in the East
Midlands, where he currently lives, this year having already seen him
perform The Strange Tale Of The Glasgow Golem & Falling For The
Ushers in Nottingham. Previously in Belper he has performed Falling
For The Ushers & The Blackwater Bride. Two plays of his have been
commissioned for the last two Buxton Festivals – Redder Than Roses:
A Glimpse Of Mary, Queen Of Scots & The Woman On The Bridge. A
new play has been commissioned by Cromford Mill for premiere in
October of this year.
