October 5 – 15
If you want your horror infused with some comedy, playwright Hannah A. Nielsen and producer/director Kayla Walker (Seattle Public Theatre’s Titanish) have an irresistible concoction this Halloween season with their brand-new play, Misanthropy. Described as a cross between Friends and the 2000 teen werewolf cult movie Ginger Snaps, Walker calls it “a comedy about mental health, self-transformation, the friends that love you through the good, the bad, and the bloody.”
“I love plays that are about hard topics [such as] mental health and generational dispositions for depression and addiction in entertaining, digestible packages,” Walker told The Ticket. “As we move into and continue in our ‘post-Covid’ world, I desperately don’t want the importance of discussing mental health to disappear. Normalizing it by making it an undercurrent in a comedy is so important. I think we have to laugh to heal, to accept, to process.”
Nielsen seconded that notion. “My favorite way to talk about serious issues is with a sense of humor. In real life this sometimes gets me disgruntled looks, but in play form I’m hoping to get a laugh (even if it’s an uncomfortable laugh). I’m not here to bog people down with a heavy subject. If I can shine an irreverent yet respectful light on something that’s important to me, fantastic, and if I can scare and gross people out a little along the way, even better.”
“I am also a HUGE horror movie buff,” Walker continued. “Doing horror in a comedy allows the funny bits to be really funny and the scary bits to really land since we keep reminding the audience, ‘Oh, don’t worry, you’re safe, it’s just a play,’ while giving you the thrills and chills you can only get when scary sounds are being made in the same room, in the dark⊔
“It’s both hilarious and bloody,” Walker concluded. “What more could you want in October?”
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