Full Article Text
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 04, 2019
THEATER: BOO! A Halloween Scare Fest Closes
Its Eyes To The Real Terror
I CAN'T SEE * out of ****
NIGHTMARE NYC
Every year, New York City becomes haunted by scary pop-up sites of
horror. One of the big players is Psycho Clan, the team behindNightmare (which ran for 15 years) and other hits like This Is Real,
not to mention immersive shows geared towards other holidays like
Full Bunny Contact and Santastical. These are not your parents'haunted houses. And I've seen none of them or any of the shows bytheir competitors. Why? I'm a scaredy cat. Jump out from around acorner and yell "Boo!" and I guarantee I'll squeal and leap out of my
shoes.
I am very, very easy to frighten. I think it began in first grade at St.
Coleman's Catholic School. I sat in the front row of Sister Patricia'sclass, a very nice, even quiet nun who I shared a birthday with. She
liked me, I was a good student and we got along. But I was also easily
distracted and quite the talker. When I wasn't absorbed in somereading, I was chatting with the students around me. And when otherstudents began talking and the noise in the room reached a fever pitch,Sister Patricia had a go-to tactic of snapping us back into silence. She
took off her flat-heeled shoe and slammed it on a desk with a hard rap.
BAM! BAM! BAM! That shut us up quick. And she didn't slam it onjust any desk. She slammed it on my desk. And since I was alwaysthoroughly absorbed in what I was reading or saying, it invariablycaught me completely unawares. Kids in the back row would jump a
little in their seats. Me? I hit the ceiling and my heart raced and it was
a few minutes before I could catch my breath. Soon, I developed anervous tic.
Ok, not really, but I am easy to scare. The new show I Can't See didn't
scare me in the least.MICHAEL GILTZ AT WORK
Michael Giltz is a freelance writer
based in NYC and can be reached atmgiltz@pipeline.com
FAVORITE LINKS
Americablog
Five O'Clock Lightning baseball blogDeep Pop -- Lori Lakin's Blog
The Back Page -- Jason Page on ESPN
Radio
Cine-Blog -- George Robinson's Blog
Documents On Art & Cinema - Daryl
Chin's Blog
Brucie G's Wondrous Blog Of
Adventure and Mystery -- Bruce
Greenspan's Blog
BLOG ARCHIVE
▼ 2019 (71)
▼ October (9)
THEATER: "Terra Firma" Is On
Shaky Ground
It's a fine conceit. You experience this show completely in the dark!
They blindfold you, slap headphones onto you and you experience an
auditory experience while you stumble around following "umbilicals"from one area of the room to another. You take an Uber ride, stand ata bar, sit on the floor of a haunted mansion and all the while potentialhorrors are taking place all around you. Adding to the almost-full
sensory experience are the sort of stunts pulled at fraternity and
sorority hazings for generations. "Things" brush against you, coolbreezes blow on you, water drips at you from a leak in ceiling and so
on. In the show's best effect, someone throws up on you in that bar in
a nicely warm queasy effect that of course is quickly brushed off and
leaves no stains.
Unfortunately, none of the show is well thought out or hangs together.It begins in a vaguely medical setting, where people in white lab coatsprepare you for your experience by blindfolding you and giving you a"pill" (a very tart SweetTart, I'd say) to help download the experience.
You're encouraged to follow simple rules like "Don't die," which is
always good advice.
But that doesn't quite gibe with the idea that you're going to be placed
in a horror film setting -- in real life, you laugh at the people in the
movie who make dumb choices. Here, now, you'll find out what acoward you really are. But that doesn't work since you're not the maincharacter in the play and you never make a single choice.
And none of that set-up works easily with the very banal radio play
taking place in the auditory portion of the evening. Ninety-ninepercent of the experience is preparation, with you and friends meetingup, hanging out at a bar, planning to spend the night in a hauntedhouse and then Ubering over to the site. None of it is scary or
particularly interesting. If you want to scare people, a radio play where
you hear the iPhone ding of an incoming text or wait while anothercharacter Venmo's money to a landlord isn't going to cut it.THEATER: "The Glass
Menagerie" Sans Tricks Or
Trea...
THEATER: Wrestling With
Faith in "Heroes Of The Fo...
THEATER: A Bright Future In
Reach For "Chasing Rai...
THEATER: The Not-So "Great
Society"
THEATER: BOO! A Halloween
Scare Fest Closes Its Ey...
THEATER: "A(loft) Modulation"
-- A Play With Jazz ...
THEATER: "Freestyle Love
Supreme" and "Derren
Brow...
BOOKS: A Fantasy Classic
Finally Translated Into E...
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► 2011 (15)
► 2010 (10)
► 2009 (43)
► 2008 (86)
► 2007 (781)
► 2006 (2412)
► 2005 (5)
Literally none of this is scary, though it must be amusing for the
behind-the-scenes team to guide audience members to stumble thisway or that, gently sitting them down for one bit and then guidingthem back up for the next. In the last few minutes of the show, youfinally enter the haunted house and friends start to fall asleep (or
disappear; it wasn't quite clear to me). It happens in such banalfashion that it's only later you realize this is the climactic horror of theevening, rather than just the prelude. Soon you're "blinded" by theflashlights of more lab-coated technicians and then bundled out into
the night. About the only distinctive touch is their gender-neutral
reference to all audience members as "Sam" since you'll be called"Sam" throughout the recorded adventure. Oh and both at thebeginning and the end, a technician will casually say, "I love you."
Well, I love you too.
I Can't See rightly says the scariest thing in the world is your
imagination. Sadly, this work by Timothy Haskell and Paul Smithyman
lacks it almost entirely.
THEATER OF 2019
Frankenstein: Under The Radar Fest at the Public ** 1/2
Minor Character: Under The Radar Festival at the Public ***
Ink: Under The Radar Festival at the Public ** 1/2
Choir Boy ** 1/2
White Noise ** 1/2
Kiss Me, Kate ***
Ain't No Mo' *** 1/2
Ain't Too Proud **
The Cradle Will Rock * 1/2
Mrs. Murray's Menagerie *** 1/2
Oklahoma! (on Broadway) ** 1/2
Socrates **
The Pain Of My Belligerence *
Burn This **
Hadestown *** 1/2
All My Sons * 1/2
Tootsie ** 1/2
Ink ***
Beetlejuice **
Estado Vegetal ***
Hans Christian Andersen * 1/2
Cirque du Soleil: Luzia ***
BLKS ** 1/2
Moulin Rouge ** 1/2
Bat Out Of Hell **
Unchilding **
Sea Wall/ A Life ** 1/2
Harry Potter and the Cursed Child ***
Betrayal *** 1/2
Fifty Million Frenchmen ** 1/2
Freestyle Love Supreme ** 1/2
Derren Brown: Secret ***
(A)loft Modulation * 1/2
The Great Society **
I Can't See *
Heroes Of The Fourth Turning
Thanks for reading. Michael Giltz is the creator of BookFilter, a book
lover’s best friend. It’s a website that lets you browse for books online the
way you do in a physical bookstore, provides comprehensive info on new
releases every week in every category and offers passionate personal
recommendations every step of the way. He’s also the cohost of Showbiz
Sandbox , a weekly pop culture podcast that reveals the industry take on
entertainment news of the day with top journalists and opinion makers as
guests. It’s available for free on iTunes. Visit Michael Giltz at his website.
Download his podcast of celebrity interviews and his radio show, also called
Popsurfing and also available for free on iTunes.
POSTED BY MICHAEL GILTZ AT 6:22 PM
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THEATER: BOO! A Halloween Scare Fest Closes
Its Eyes To The Real Terror
I CAN'T SEE * out of ****
NIGHTMARE NYC
Every year, New York City becomes haunted by scary pop-up sites of
horror. One of the big players is Psycho Clan, the team behindNightmare (which ran for 15 years) and other hits like This Is Real,
not to mention immersive shows geared towards other holidays like
Full Bunny Contact and Santastical. These are not your parents'haunted houses. And I've seen none of them or any of the shows bytheir competitors. Why? I'm a scaredy cat. Jump out from around acorner and yell "Boo!" and I guarantee I'll squeal and leap out of my
shoes.
I am very, very easy to frighten. I think it began in first grade at St.
Coleman's Catholic School. I sat in the front row of Sister Patricia'sclass, a very nice, even quiet nun who I shared a birthday with. She
liked me, I was a good student and we got along. But I was also easily
distracted and quite the talker. When I wasn't absorbed in somereading, I was chatting with the students around me. And when otherstudents began talking and the noise in the room reached a fever pitch,Sister Patricia had a go-to tactic of snapping us back into silence. She
took off her flat-heeled shoe and slammed it on a desk with a hard rap.
BAM! BAM! BAM! That shut us up quick. And she didn't slam it onjust any desk. She slammed it on my desk. And since I was alwaysthoroughly absorbed in what I was reading or saying, it invariablycaught me completely unawares. Kids in the back row would jump a
little in their seats. Me? I hit the ceiling and my heart raced and it was
a few minutes before I could catch my breath. Soon, I developed anervous tic.
Ok, not really, but I am easy to scare. The new show I Can't See didn't
scare me in the least.MICHAEL GILTZ AT WORK
Michael Giltz is a freelance writer
based in NYC and can be reached atmgiltz@pipeline.com
FAVORITE LINKS
Americablog
Five O'Clock Lightning baseball blogDeep Pop -- Lori Lakin's Blog
The Back Page -- Jason Page on ESPN
Radio
Cine-Blog -- George Robinson's Blog
Documents On Art & Cinema - Daryl
Chin's Blog
Brucie G's Wondrous Blog Of
Adventure and Mystery -- Bruce
Greenspan's Blog
BLOG ARCHIVE
▼ 2019 (71)
▼ October (9)
THEATER: "Terra Firma" Is On
Shaky Ground
It's a fine conceit. You experience this show completely in the dark!
They blindfold you, slap headphones onto you and you experience an
auditory experience while you stumble around following "umbilicals"from one area of the room to another. You take an Uber ride, stand ata bar, sit on the floor of a haunted mansion and all the while potentialhorrors are taking place all around you. Adding to the almost-full
sensory experience are the sort of stunts pulled at fraternity and
sorority hazings for generations. "Things" brush against you, coolbreezes blow on you, water drips at you from a leak in ceiling and so
on. In the show's best effect, someone throws up on you in that bar in
a nicely warm queasy effect that of course is quickly brushed off and
leaves no stains.
Unfortunately, none of the show is well thought out or hangs together.It begins in a vaguely medical setting, where people in white lab coatsprepare you for your experience by blindfolding you and giving you a"pill" (a very tart SweetTart, I'd say) to help download the experience.
You're encouraged to follow simple rules like "Don't die," which is
always good advice.
But that doesn't quite gibe with the idea that you're going to be placed
in a horror film setting -- in real life, you laugh at the people in the
movie who make dumb choices. Here, now, you'll find out what acoward you really are. But that doesn't work since you're not the maincharacter in the play and you never make a single choice.
And none of that set-up works easily with the very banal radio play
taking place in the auditory portion of the evening. Ninety-ninepercent of the experience is preparation, with you and friends meetingup, hanging out at a bar, planning to spend the night in a hauntedhouse and then Ubering over to the site. None of it is scary or
particularly interesting. If you want to scare people, a radio play where
you hear the iPhone ding of an incoming text or wait while anothercharacter Venmo's money to a landlord isn't going to cut it.THEATER: "The Glass
Menagerie" Sans Tricks Or
Trea...
THEATER: Wrestling With
Faith in "Heroes Of The Fo...
THEATER: A Bright Future In
Reach For "Chasing Rai...
THEATER: The Not-So "Great
Society"
THEATER: BOO! A Halloween
Scare Fest Closes Its Ey...
THEATER: "A(loft) Modulation"
-- A Play With Jazz ...
THEATER: "Freestyle Love
Supreme" and "Derren
Brow...
BOOKS: A Fantasy Classic
Finally Translated Into E...
► September (11)
► August (9)
► July (7)
► June (3)
► May (8)
► April (10)
► March (5)
► February (1)
► January (8)
► 2018 (38)
► 2017 (6)
► 2016 (2)
► 2015 (29)
► 2014 (2)
► 2013 (5)
► 2012 (17)
► 2011 (15)
► 2010 (10)
► 2009 (43)
► 2008 (86)
► 2007 (781)
► 2006 (2412)
► 2005 (5)
Literally none of this is scary, though it must be amusing for the
behind-the-scenes team to guide audience members to stumble thisway or that, gently sitting them down for one bit and then guidingthem back up for the next. In the last few minutes of the show, youfinally enter the haunted house and friends start to fall asleep (or
disappear; it wasn't quite clear to me). It happens in such banalfashion that it's only later you realize this is the climactic horror of theevening, rather than just the prelude. Soon you're "blinded" by theflashlights of more lab-coated technicians and then bundled out into
the night. About the only distinctive touch is their gender-neutral
reference to all audience members as "Sam" since you'll be called"Sam" throughout the recorded adventure. Oh and both at thebeginning and the end, a technician will casually say, "I love you."
Well, I love you too.
I Can't See rightly says the scariest thing in the world is your
imagination. Sadly, this work by Timothy Haskell and Paul Smithyman
lacks it almost entirely.
THEATER OF 2019
Frankenstein: Under The Radar Fest at the Public ** 1/2
Minor Character: Under The Radar Festival at the Public ***
Ink: Under The Radar Festival at the Public ** 1/2
Choir Boy ** 1/2
White Noise ** 1/2
Kiss Me, Kate ***
Ain't No Mo' *** 1/2
Ain't Too Proud **
The Cradle Will Rock * 1/2
Mrs. Murray's Menagerie *** 1/2
Oklahoma! (on Broadway) ** 1/2
Socrates **
The Pain Of My Belligerence *
Burn This **
Hadestown *** 1/2
All My Sons * 1/2
Tootsie ** 1/2
Ink ***
Beetlejuice **
Estado Vegetal ***
Hans Christian Andersen * 1/2
Cirque du Soleil: Luzia ***
BLKS ** 1/2
Moulin Rouge ** 1/2
Bat Out Of Hell **
Unchilding **
Sea Wall/ A Life ** 1/2
Harry Potter and the Cursed Child ***
Betrayal *** 1/2
Fifty Million Frenchmen ** 1/2
Freestyle Love Supreme ** 1/2
Derren Brown: Secret ***
(A)loft Modulation * 1/2
The Great Society **
I Can't See *
Heroes Of The Fourth Turning
Thanks for reading. Michael Giltz is the creator of BookFilter, a book
lover’s best friend. It’s a website that lets you browse for books online the
way you do in a physical bookstore, provides comprehensive info on new
releases every week in every category and offers passionate personal
recommendations every step of the way. He’s also the cohost of Showbiz
Sandbox , a weekly pop culture podcast that reveals the industry take on
entertainment news of the day with top journalists and opinion makers as
guests. It’s available for free on iTunes. Visit Michael Giltz at his website.
Download his podcast of celebrity interviews and his radio show, also called
Popsurfing and also available for free on iTunes.
POSTED BY MICHAEL GILTZ AT 6:22 PM
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