Zombie Joe's Underground Theatre's URBAN DEATH Enters Open Run at the Players Theatre

Zombie Joe’s Underground Theatre Group strikes Greenwich Village like a lightning-bolt with URBAN DEATH - their ultimate and timely theatrical horror production.  URBAN DEATH  blends classic Grand Guignol Theatre with brisk European Tableaux technique, with modern dance choreography, with the trials and tribulations of the two-bit daily grind… into one chilling hour-long spin-cycle of late-night terrifying fun at The Players Theatre. URBAN DEATH winds a dark trail of 36 fast and frightening vignettes, executed with such high-impact, extreme blood-curdling ferocity – all free from the bondage of wordy dialogue.

Andy Webster of The New York Times describes URBAN DEATH: “It begins with a mound of ghoul-like bodies awakening in an empty space and morphs into a procession of tableaus, many of them digs at show business: slow-moving male bodybuilders flex freakishly; three barely clad lovers entwine in a spotlight, like porn stars; a homeless woman pleading for attention is attacked by a masked assailant; models pose as if for a Vanity Fair cover although they resemble corpses; a man, his head encased in plastic, suspends from a rope, a still life of autoerotic fatality.”

Mr. Webster praises URBAN DEATH “for first-rate makeup…costumes and sheer, vital stagecraft. There may be many spooky stage productions around this Halloween, but few will approach the level of this one.”

And Michael Mraz of NYTheatre.com describes URBAN DEATH as “giving the audience a taut hour-long thrill-ride through more than 30 wordless horror vignettes…This show deserves a packed audience, if not for its clever adaptation of horror for the stage, then for the overall atmosphere”.

URBAN DEATH performs Thursdays, Fridays & Saturdays @ 11pm at The Players Theatre, 115 MacDougal Street, 3rd Floor. (No Performances Friday October 31).  For Tickets, call Theatermania at 212-352-3101, or Visit Theatermania.com.

Zombie Joe's Underground Theatre Group sprouted from a small industrial garage in Southern California's San Fernando Valley in 1992. Zombie Joe founded the company based on the ground-breaking theatrical doctrines of Antonin Artaud ( the 20th Century French dramatist who advocated a theatre of cruelty), Bertolt Brecht, Anton Chekhov, Ivan Turgenev, Fyodor Dostoevsky and George Lucas.

Building on the traditions of these innovators, Zombie Joe developed his own style of 'progressive' theatre, blending high impact, fast-moving, tightly-chisled live theatre. Zombie Joe's productions combine classical and original works. Now based in the No-Ho Arts District of North Hollywood, CA, the company made its New York debut this fall with their original award-winning adaptation of Edgar Allan Poe's "Masque of the Red Death" which has been nominated for three LA Weekly Theatre Awards. The LA Times described Zombie Joe's Underground as 'a model of barebones ingenuity' and LA Weekly called the company 'one of Los Angeles' living treasures.' The group won the LA Weekly Award as 2007 Best One-Act Ensemble for "Masque of the Red Death" as well as several Artistic Director Achievement Awards (ADA). In 2005 the original production of URBAN DEATH was nominated for Best Ensemble Cast and Best Director ( Zombie Joe) by The Valley Theatre League's Artistic Director Achievement Awards.

To post a comment, you must register and login.