HOUSE OF THE EXQUISITE CORPSE III Extended At Steppenwolf's Merle Reskin Garage

Rough House Theater of Chicago is extending House of the Exquisite Corpse III, Chicago’s one and only immersive puppet haunted house, through November 4 at Steppenwolf's Merle Reskin Garage Space, 1624 N. Halsted St. in Lincoln Park.

Originally set to close October 31, Rough House will now welcome puppet horror thrill seekers Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights from 7 p.m. to 9:30 p.m., through November 4. Small groups gather in the dark bar and lobby, and are beckoned inside every 15 minutes. 

House of the Exquisite Corpse III, with an all-new program of six immersive acts of puppet horror ready to shock, scare, astonish and delight, is also open Halloween Night, Tuesday, October 31.

Purchase tickets and pre-select entry times at RoughHouseTheater.com. Tickets are $16-$46. Rough House also offers several Pay What You Want options. This production is recommended for ages 14 and over. 

This year, Rough House’s Halloween peep show/puppet theater anthology is inspired by the book “Our Homes and How to Keep Them Healthy,” published in 1883 by Robert Brudenell Carter.  

Top Chicago theater artists, working alone or in teams, selected six chapters including “The Difficulty of Proof in Cases of Arsenic Poisoning,” “The Dangers of Rebreathed Air” and “Advantages of the Removal of The Sick” to unleash and lay open their darkest creative impulses.  

For 2023, House of the Exquisite Corpse III stitches together six puppet peep-shows created by Chicago artists who work in multiple disciplines, including Pablo Monterrubio-Benet and Grace Needlman, Tom Lee and Sam Lewis, Corey Smith, Claire Bauman, Chio Cabrera and Jacky Kelsey, Justin D’Acci and Sion Silva, Ken Buckingham, and Felix Mayes and Kevin Michael Wesson. Process directors are Claire Saxe and Mike Oleon.

Audiences enter House of the Exquisite Corpse in small groups via timed entries. Once inside, they must brave its dark halls for about an hour, stopping at each room to spy through keyholes, cracks, and hidden doors to witness the horrors within. 

Through original puppetry, physical performance, soundscape, and illusion, each room terrifies as it enraptures. Collectively, anyone who loves haunted houses or theater of the macabre will feel buyer’s envy after touring the otherworld ills plaguing Rough House Theater’s horrifying domestic spaces. 

About Rough House Theater Co.

Rough House Theater Co. is on a mission to connect individuals and communities through art that celebrates the weird things that make us unique and the weirder things that bring us together.

Rough House creates theater that captures the heart through the eye. Their shows use puppetry, music, and human performance to tell intimate stories, as strange as they are sincere.

Through performances, presentations of work by fellow artists, and artist training, Rough House aspires to make Chicago a national hub of contemporary puppet theater, comprising a diverse and ever-growing community of audiences and artists. The company’s work has appeared in the National Puppetry Festival, The Chicago International Puppet Theater Festival, punk houses, funeral parlors, a lotion factory, and the woods of Appalachia.

For more information, visit RoughHouseTheater.com and follow the company on Instagram and Facebook.

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