Tim Foley’s haunted-house puzzle becomes a thrilling one-man fright fest, with George Naylor gripping throughout the clever theatrical trickery.
The play that brought writer Tim Foley to award-winning attention was Electric Rosary, which featured a robot nun. With this new work, he sticks with matters spiritual but turns his attention to the classic haunted house mystery.
We’re talking ghosts, shadows, ancient curses and the portrait of a sickly child.
This is obviously a one-man play, that man being the dynamic and companionable George Naylor. Only he isn’t alone, is he? Because there is Pete Malkin and Joshua Pharo and Tom Robbins as well.
They are, in turn, sound designer, lighting and video designer, and set designer. They deserve upfront credits because they work wonders. The production is sensational in all interpretations of that word, filling the black box with sufficient jump-scares, crashes, whoops, and spooky backdrops to create something akin to a theme park ride.
What’s the story?
Then there’s director Neil Bettles who has taken a cinematic script and devised an evening packed with theatrical trickery to match Foley’s fireworks.
To the story then, and the small seed which grows and keeps growing until, at one point, you think: enough with the new things. We’re beginning to lose our way.
Which is an apt analogy. For Joe (Naylor), a down-on-his-luck actor, has been commissioned by sinister toff David Linden to walk around the eerie perimeter of Paragon House in period costume to frighten his nieces who are staying for the holidays.
George Naylor as Joe in It Walks Around The House at Night
Doesn’t turn out like that, of course, because Joe fears he is not the only one making the mysterious trudge through the dense thickets and lonely trails. There may be two people circling the house. Or maybe three. And maybe not even people at all.
Announcing a character called The Dancer (Oliver Baines) upfront doesn’t give the game away but does suggest we are not alone in unusual and kinetic ways.
What’s the verdict?
Joe wants to leave, but he fancies David and he’s getting paid an astronomical sum. Also, there’s a strange compulsion to untangle this knotty puzzle. Because Paragon House was demolished decades ago according to Google, and who is that man at the window?
Critics of Electric Rosary declared that Foley tried to cram too much into the second half. He avoids part of that problem here by not having a second half at all – no interval snifter to settle the nerves – but he does insist on wringing the cloth dry in search of a topper. The plot, like the forest, gets thicker and more impenetrable the further we wander in.
However, there’s no escaping the grip of this play: it is a well-conjured fright fest, a confident piece of storytelling and a wholly entertaining experience if your idea of fun involves a growing sense of menace.
It Walks Around The House At Night runs at the Southwark Playhouse Borough until 28 March, 2025.
This review first appeared on The Spy In The Stalls.