If Dracula haunted your dreams, what might occur in this liminal realm? Bram Stoker didn’t answer this in his infamous novel, but Dracula: Lucy’s Dream at Pleasance at EICC dives all the way in with a haunting physical and puppet theatre piece that will make you far more sympathetic to Stoker’s side character.
For those familiar enough with Bram Stoker’s book or the assorted movies based on it, you might be familiar with Lucy, Mina Harker’s best friend and confidante. In the book, Mina is married but Lucy is not yet, instead continually courting numerous potential suitors and choosing none of them. There’s an implication about Lucy’s virtue here, which ultimately makes her Dracula’s first English victim in the book; this production, though, does not give an excuse to Dracula’s machinations and evil magic. The basis might be Lucy’s slow exsanguination over a handful of hypnotic nights, but the performance lives in Lucy’s mind, in her victimisation by a powerful supernatural being, as she slept or was hypnotised.
The plot makes enough sense, but the performance is mesmerising thanks to Plexus Polaire’s incredible ensemble and magnificent puppetry. Dreams are spun from puppets and fabric and movement, with only occasional digital projections. The five-person ensemble of Dominique Cattani, Yejin Choi, Sebastian (Tato) Moya, Marina Simonova, and Kyra Vandenenden (alternating with Cristina Iosif) feel like far more puppeteers, manipulating everything from large stone columns, a dog, bats, numerous Dream Lucys, the ‘real’ Lucy, and Dracula. Music from Ane Marthe Sørlien Holen will stick in your brain like the last fumes of a nightmare.
Dracula: Lucy’s Dream has many surprising magical moments. For instance, Lucy is embodied by at least three cast members, but when she is awake, she is a puppet: frail, requiring support, constantly batted about by the forces of those in her household who have more control. When she is asleep, she is fully embodied and has more agency (this is a hint at the end). One scene with multiple Lucys involves red fabric as blood which coats the three avatars and which they revel in. I had a good vantage point in the large theatre space, and I still thought the blood bursts were digital projections at first because they were so fluid.
Absolutely do not miss Dracula: Lucy’s Dream at Pleasance at EICC this fringe. It will stick in your mind like a haunting memory.
Listings and ticket information can be found here
