Before The Witching Hour begins, the enormous (barn-like) space of the Bridewell is filled with an intriguing (barn-like) soundscape. Disappointingly, this proves irrelevant but it certainly draws the audience in as the jangling sounds are slowly subsumed by a low drone that builds and builds in intensity… and stops, as these things do. Ignoring a brief and best-cut opening scene, the play begins with Professor Dubois, an academic, played by Mark Kitto with all the geniality and erudition one would expect from a university lecturer who knows he has his students in the palm of his hand. So much so Ghost Stories. Dubois is there to give us an illustrated lecture on witchcraft and folklore which could and should have been longer. At the end there are questions from the audience and… we’re away. Lecturer and student meet afterwards and he sets her off on a local case of witchcraft and an abandoned house in the woods – so much so Blair Witch. As well as seventeenth-century witchery, there is a familial curse, disappearing children and events that occur at 3.33 in the morning – 2:22 A Ghost Story anyone?- as well as the madness of crowds and a possible link to #MeToo? It’s all catnip for Erin Bailey, played by Jessica Porter. Bailey is an unconvincingly one-dimensional student fighting the patriarchy by basically falling in with whatever the patriarchy directs her to do. Teamed with her brother Sam, an outstanding Saul Bache, Erin decides – would you believe it? – to visit the house in the woods…
Which is where the play really begins.
Alex Johnson’s set is revealed, West End standard and then some. It deserves so much more than the half-hearted soundscape and the misjudged cyber-disco lighting that flashes across the façade every now and then. This grimly forbidding stone building is the home of Elspeth Langford, who is… The Witch. We know she’s a witch and not just a woman because there is a pentagram and we know we will see her because she’s mentioned in the programme. And see her we do as the scenes in which she appears provide most of the stuffing in this over-upholstered and desperately overlong piece. We will repeatedly be told she wasn’t a witch but just a woman but as she’s capable of levying a centuries-old curse she plainly was a witch. We will find out… The Truth. We see Elspeth tried (twice) by a priest in a shiny Peter Sellers wig. We see Elspeth drowned (twice). And we see Elspeth waving her arms (many, many times). Clever use of a scrim is undermined by overuse of a scrim and in the play’s weakest scene the witch runs about the stage like Liz Truss trying to find the exit. As Elspeth, Eleanor May Blackburn does her best but is overwhelmed by a storyline that – as well as everything else – has echoes of The Witch, The Omen, Ringu and St Maud while deriving, consciously or otherwise, from two short stories by MR James – ‘The Ash Tree’ and Lost Hearts’. One is left wanting to scream “less is more” at the director (and creator) James Williams. His “creation” is centred on a genuinely satisfying idea. While it’s unfair to say that “this is bullshit” (as one character quotably opines) Williams’ clever kernel is smothered in padding that stretches out his story to a numbing two hours and drowns all subtlety in a welter of terrible “jump scare” music that is deafeningly loud – for the Bridewell at least. That said, this pop culture pot-pourri would make the basis of a terrifying horror film, and he should get a synopsis to the likes of Blumhouse as quickly as possible before someone else has that idea.
Review by Louis Mazzini
Blood will have blood on the Witches’ Sabbath – and Torhill Wood is a place of unspeakable horrors. Erin and Sam soon realise their trip to these eerie woods will not pass without their fair share of witchcraft – and murder. Their trip will become a haunting fight for survival in this gasp-out-loud ghost story.
Saturated with tension and accompanied by entirely original compositions, The Witching Hour brings the past to the present, clearly depicting the modern themes prevalent in today’s society, set against the chilling backdrop of old England’s witch trials. Amongst the scares and tension, the performance shines a light on feminism, disbelieved and forgotten women, torture, familial abuse, sexual assault, and bias against certain groups within the justice system.
CAST
Professor Dubois / Reverend – Mark Kitto (he/him)
Erin Bailey – Jessica Porter (she/her)
Sam Bailey – Saul Bache (he/him)
Elspeth Langford – Eleanor May Blackburn (she/her)
CREATIVE
Writer/Director – James Williams (he/him)
Set and Lighting Design – Alex Johnson (he/him)
Sound Design – Dan Clarkson (he/him)
Original Compositions – Ashley MA Walsh (he/him)
Associate Set and Lighting – Joanne Marshall (she/her)
Associate Director – Alexandra Whiteley (she/her)
THE WITCHING HOUR
15 to 20 July 2024
Bridewell Theatre, 14 Bride Lane, London EC4Y 8EQ
