Review Roundup: DRACULA, A COMEDY OF TERRORS at Menier Chocolate Factory

The Menier Chocolate Factory is presenting the UK premiere of Dracula, A Comedy of Terrors by Gordon Greenberg and Steve Rosen. Dracula, A Comedy of Terrors gives Bram Stoker’s horror classic a comic makeover in this lightning-fast gender-bending reimagining that features a Gen Z pansexual Count Dracula in the midst of an existential crisis. With a cast of five switching costumes and roles at the drop of a hat, this 90-minute freewheeling send-up plays with sexuality and gender norms in the spirit of comedy legends Charles Ludlam, Monty Python and Mel Brooks – and celebrates goth, camp, and the magic of live theatre itself. 

In the treacherous mountains of Transylvania, Jonathan Harker, a meek English estate agent, takes a harrowing journey to meet a new and mysterious client, who happens to be the most terrifying(ly narcissistic) monster the world has ever known: Count Dracula! When the Count sets his sights on Harker’s fiancé, the brilliant young earth scientist Lucy Westfeldt, he meets his match for the first time – as well as a slew of other colorful characters including vampire hunter Jean Van Helsing, insect connoisseur Renfield and behavioral psychiatrist Wallace Westfeldt, whose British country estate doubles as a free-range mental asylum. See what the critics are saying...

Cindy Marcolina, BroadwayWorld: Greenberg’s direction pays homage to traditional stagecraft in the silliest of ways. Mist and fog come from spray cans, while the actors meticulously scramble to tell their story with physical props and sound cues. Ironically, it’s a refreshing, utterly delightful approach that amps up a refined, in-your-face brand of humour. While the script is rude and unashamed, it manages to remain exceptionally sanitised - think sophisticated adult panto without the callbacks to the audience.

Arifa Akbar, The Guardian: The five-strong cast juggle multiple roles with particularly fast work by Dianne Pilkington as various characters including Lucy’s father. The performances are superb all round, full of fun and mischief, but the low-hanging jokes of the script short-change the actors’ talents. This comedy needs sharper fangs.

Nick Curtis, Evening Standard: Exaggerated parody is a Marmite genre. You either love it or hate it, but it can take only a minor miscalibration in tone or pitch for affection to turn to abhorrence. I found Titanique delightful but many close to me loathed it. I’m deeply irritated by the way Dracula insulates itself against criticism by telling us how slapdash it’s going to be (“you’ll be horrified – one way or another!”). But mostly I was just unamused and bored.

Clive Davis, The Times: Some of the script seems to have been tweaked to appeal to British audiences. That said, I’m not sure a joke about Janet Street-Porter’s teeth means an awful lot to anyone under pension age. Tijana Bjelajac’s set design has a touch of Rocky Horror Gothic, Ben Cracknell’s lighting is all tongue-in-cheek Sturm und Drang, and Yvonne Gilbert’s sound design adds cheeky comic effects. Have a strong drink or two before you go and abandon yourself to the sheer silliness of it all.

Andrzej Lukowski, TimeOut: Dracula, A Comedy of Terrors is affable enough and probably a decent shout to take your grandparents to: it’s old fashioned, not offensive. But why bother going to the effort of bringing it over from New York? Stoker’s Count famously caused a stir when he came to London; Greenberg and Rosen’s elicits a weak smile at best.

Average Rating: 58.0%