Review: GORGON: A HORROR STORY, VAULT Festival

It's very hard to distillate horror and put it on stage. Theatre works on the separation between audience and performers, and the surprising effects that one can successfully employ live in performance are relatively limited by the realistic nature of the mean, therefore companies usually only rely on well-timed but ultimately cheap jump-scares to achieve their frightening goals.

Not Elf Lyons. Through live foley artistry, gory tricks, and meticulous atmospheric finesse she delivers a horrifying tale of repressed anger. Gorgon: A Horror Story is an evocative, terrifying play that meddles with the audience's perception of the genre turning the spook factor up to the max.

She imbues it with pure humour to diffuse the tension only to charge the crowd with gore and revulsion. She details her psychopathic tendencies with such flippancy, describing a scarred childhood marred by the death of her parents and an abusive guardianship. It's horridly captivating to sit and watch the harrowing events as they unfold while her narration swings between character comedy and absolute terror - kind of like.

Lyons is supported by the phenomenal Natalie Williams and David Houston, who man the foley and take on the role of all those who've had the pleasure of meeting the Gorgon. The subterranean vibe of The Vaults' largest room with its loud noises of the train coming from above perfectly compliment the show, while designer Sophia Pardon makes sure that taxidermy is a shared affair.

What's absolutely remarkable is that the piece is a truly enjoyable and thought-provoking experience on many levels. Whether this is due to Lyon's exuberance as she brushes off her killing sprees, the rationalisation of abuse, or to people's morbid curiosity, Gorgon works in every little detail. It's exciting, funny, disgusting, sad, and - most importantly - scary.

Gorgon: A Horror Story runs at VAULT Festival until 9 February.

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