“I’ve seen this horror movie before,” declares Henry (Travis A. Knight) as he and his girlfriend, Max (Sadieh Rifai), stumble into a remote cabin in the woods after crashing their car on a snowy mountain pass. Little good that knowledge does him. Levi Holloway’s Grey House takes a classic fright-flick set-up and suffuses it with a singular sense of eeriness. The play sometimes stumbles when it tries to turn mood into action, but its indelible weirdness, aided by director Shade Murray’s creeptastic world-premiere production, glows through.
Children’s games with brutal consequences, the sound of scratching from within the house’s walls, sudden blackouts with mysterious whispers: The titular grey house is a well and truly haunted place. Henry and Max are welcomed inside by four girls—Marlow (Sadieh Rifai), Squirrel (Autumn Hlava), Bernie (Kayla Casiano) and A1656 (Haley Bolithon)—and an unnamed boy (Charlie Herman). Per tradition, these kids are profoundly unsettling, especially the threateningly precocious Marlow and the semi-feral Squirrel. There’s an adult in the house as well; her name is Raleigh (Kirsten Fitzgerald), and while her link to the children is uncertain, she definitely isn’t in charge. The Ancient (Dado), who appears to Henry in the dead of night, might have a better claim to that power.
As at the Overlook Hotel and Hill House, this remote cabin and its residents peel their guests of their presumptions and defenses, stripping little lies away to get at dark truths underneath. After some time, a motive emerges, though it remains slightly vague. Grey House manages to explain both too much and too little. Still, its primal mythology—rooted in an endless karmic cycle of violence, abuse and escape—packs a hell of a wallop.
Murray’s production makes perfect use of A Red Orchid Theatre’s cramped, oblong space, with audience members as close to the action as they would be in any haunted house. The script’s strength lies in its sense of atmosphere, and the same is true of the design: Kurt Boetcher’s set, Claire Chrzan and Mike Durst’s lights and Jeffrey Levin’s sound (plus some George A. Romero–esque special effects by Ryan Oliver and Brant McCrea) expertly conjure an air of foreboding and eventually terror. We’ve all seen this story before. Grey House leaves a mark nonetheless.
A Red Orchid Theatre. By Levi Holloway. Directed by Shade Murray. With ensemble cast. Running time: 1hr 40mins. No intermission.