With Sarah Snook’s outstanding solo show, The Picture of Dorian Gray, and the recent adaptation of Jean Genet’s The Maids at the Donmar Warehouse, director Kip Williams has found a strong formula of combining high-octane performances with stunning theatrical tech to produce unique and captivating pieces of theatre. Yet despite a terrific individual performance from Cynthia Erivo, Dracula never quite hits the same heights in this tonally contradictory production.
This is very much a like-for-like retelling of Bram Stoker’s Dracula, though with some interesting directorial choices about the backgrounds of the lead characters, especially the Count himself. Nevertheless, it is a remarkable feat by Erivo to so vividly bring to life over a dozen characters, though this is largely done through pre-recorded visuals integrated into the live projections of onstage action shown on an enormous screen. This is similar to Snook’s Dorian Gray, yet there were more opportunities in that show for onstage multirolling, whereas here the production gets a little stuck, primarily as a result of the source material’s narrative structure.
It is an accomplished attempt from Erivo, but one held back by her role that becomes more like that of a narrator. The piece is performed, oddly, at breakneck speed, which, while hinting at the sense of mania for the characters involved, is utterly exhausting to get into, threatening detachment rather than immersion.
Dracula is also compounded by some strange directorial and design choices. Vampire slayer Van Helsing lacks presence, looking more like a wise wizard than anything, too determined to take down the Count, while the humour that is evoked through the multi-rolling, fake wigs and bushy beards detracts from the suspense that the piece desperately needs.
That said, the hallmarks of Williams’ visionary approach is in its technical prowess, and this production does excel here. It is impressive to see the live and the recorded spliced together (though there are some awkward pauses in these transitions), and the stunning work of the production crew to make these moments happen live succeeds. Yet with this work, it feels less theatrical and more like a film, perhaps because so much is done to screen, with one left wishing just a little less was to the camera.
The final 15 minutes rescue the piece, and the final reveal of the Count onstage is effective, albeit overdue, resulting in a melodramatic and effective conclusion. Yet, that said, it is a shame that the rest of the piece blurs in focus, pulled too quickly from scene to scene. Perhaps some of the choices here, like Dracula, needed a stake through it.
