{"id":6868,"date":"2017-11-01T09:05:28","date_gmt":"2017-11-01T13:05:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=6868"},"modified":"2017-11-09T07:49:10","modified_gmt":"2017-11-09T12:49:10","slug":"legends-of-the-undead-are-undead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=6868","title":{"rendered":"Legends of the Undead are . . . Undead"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Cemetery,<\/a>

photo: John W. Schulze, creative commons license<\/p><\/div>\n

In Chicago recently, we took a nine-year-old to a theatrical version of Dracula<\/em> (playing at the Mercury Theater<\/a> through November 5). \u201cWeren\u2019t you scared?\u201d several audience members asked him after the show, as he was the show\u2019s youngest audience member by many decades. \u201cNo.\u201d This was said with deadpan aplomb. And possibly an eye-roll.<\/p>\n

Perhaps some of the edge was off Bram Stoker\u2019s classic because of all the much more horrifying real-life shenanigans filling the daily news, or perhaps it was because this production veered occasionally\u2014and entertainingly\u2014close to camp. While it wasn\u2019t terrifying, it had good acting and nice touches. Notably, the production credits include acknowledgment of the show\u2019s \u201cviolence and blood\/gore designer.\u201d Which gives an inkling.<\/p>\n

When the Stoker\u2019s tale first appeared 120 years ago, The Manchester Guardian<\/a><\/em> dismissed it with almost the same nonchalance as our young theater companion. \u201cMost of the delightful old superstitions of the past have an unhappy way of appearing limp and sickly in the glare of the later day,\u201d the reviewer said. \u201cMan is no longer in dread of the monstrous and the unnatural, and . . . the effect is more often grotesque than terrible.\u201d Tell that to Ann Rice and Stephenie Meyer and the legions of other authors<\/a> who continue to resurrect \u201cthe ancient legends of the were-wolf and the vampire\u201d!
\n<\/a>\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In Chicago recently, we took a nine-year-old to a theatrical version of Dracula (playing at the Mercury Theater through November 5). \u201cWeren\u2019t you scared?\u201d several audience members asked him after the show, as he was the show\u2019s youngest audience member … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Legends of the Undead are . . . Undead - predictions of their demise were way premature!","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[366,40,1160,104,147],"tags":[1161,333,678],"class_list":["post-6868","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-drama","category-fiction","category-horror","category-the-morgue","category-theater","tag-dracula","tag-london","tag-murder"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-1MM","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6868","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6868"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6868\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6870,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6868\/revisions\/6870"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6868"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6868"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6868"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}