There’s something hauntingly familiar about this dance-horror piece from new Scottish company Groupwork: ‘The Afflicted’ is a febrile patchwork of influences, from HP Lovecraft’s stories and Miller’s ‘The Crucible’, to creepypasta and found footage horror.
But it also feels utterly singular, and genuinely unnerving. Performer-dancers Olivia Barrowclough, Felixe Forde, Grace Gibson and Amy Kennedy play all of the characters in Jake Jeppson’s text, most frequently sharing the role of an unnamed journalist narrator. She (or he) begins by reminiscing about the Hope River Girls, a group of young women from an old town in upstate New York, who apparently caused a States-wide scandal in 2012, before all mention of them ceased later that year.
It’s worth being careful about giving too much away, as part of the power of Vicki Manderson and Finn den Hertog’s production is its slow, detailed build, much of it illustrated by Lewis den Hertog’s note perfect, faux-documentary video work, and the four performers’ playful, ever-so-slightly malevolent reading of the text.
The basic deal, though, is that in 2012 a number of young women from Hope River had broken into spontaneous convulsions, videos of which had gone viral online. In trying to follow up the story, the narrator stumbles across any number of theories, from a chemical spill in the ‘70s to a physical reaction their sense of extreme marginalisation as women.
One of the smartest things about ‘The Afflicted’ is that we never get an answer. But we do get a climax, thanks to the increasingly physical nature of the production. Manderson’s striking movement is twitchy and disconcerting. But while it may reference the convulsions, it doesn’t literally look like them. The girls don’t seem to be overpowered by something, but channeling it; it feels likes they’re sharing an unsettling wordless language; perhaps they have found solace from our reality in one their own.
‘The Afflicted’ is absolutely not schlock horror, but for those who like their chills cerebral and lingering, this is the good stuff – and a real calling card of a debut show.
But it also feels utterly singular, and genuinely unnerving. Performer-dancers Olivia Barrowclough, Felixe Forde, Grace Gibson and Amy Kennedy play all of the characters in Jake Jeppson’s text, most frequently sharing the role of an unnamed journalist narrator. She (or he) begins by reminiscing about the Hope River Girls, a group of young women from an old town in upstate New York, who apparently caused a States-wide scandal in 2012, before all mention of them ceased later that year.
It’s worth being careful about giving too much away, as part of the power of Vicki Manderson and Finn den Hertog’s production is its slow, detailed build, much of it illustrated by Lewis den Hertog’s note perfect, faux-documentary video work, and the four performers’ playful, ever-so-slightly malevolent reading of the text.
The basic deal, though, is that in 2012 a number of young women from Hope River had broken into spontaneous convulsions, videos of which had gone viral online. In trying to follow up the story, the narrator stumbles across any number of theories, from a chemical spill in the ‘70s to a physical reaction their sense of extreme marginalisation as women.
One of the smartest things about ‘The Afflicted’ is that we never get an answer. But we do get a climax, thanks to the increasingly physical nature of the production. Manderson’s striking movement is twitchy and disconcerting. But while it may reference the convulsions, it doesn’t literally look like them. The girls don’t seem to be overpowered by something, but channeling it; it feels likes they’re sharing an unsettling wordless language; perhaps they have found solace from our reality in one their own.
‘The Afflicted’ is absolutely not schlock horror, but for those who like their chills cerebral and lingering, this is the good stuff – and a real calling card of a debut show.
