The Enfield Haunting - Brighton / Richmond / Ambassadors

I hope this does well (although I'm not optimistic at all) and one of the reasons is that Grace Molony deserves a West End break, after her run in The Watsons was pulled so cruelly because of covid, seemingly permanently.

just got an email they canceled my performance tomorrow afternoon.

Is this play secretly a new instalment of the Goes Wrong series by Mischief Theatre 🤔

"Cast illness", "Technical issues" ....I bet they are all stressed out of their minds. Feel sorry for them. They'd have been better cancelling the tour and honing the script.

First report from the Ambassadors is in on the Facebook page - "what a pile of rubbish!!".

I had the misfortune to see this production in Richmond and I could tell there was something badly wrong only a few minutes in - leaden dialogue, aimless chit-chat, a character who's just a spare part... Yet the prices at both Richmond and Brighton were bumped up to premium.

The "plot" (such as it is) is minimal, the "scares" are few and far between - and if the audience is *laughing* at the supposedly-scary bits, that should be a clue to how badly put-together this production is. The set is two-storey, but it was virtually impossible to see clearly what was going on upstairs from the middle of the stalls. I'd not read any reviews prior to my visit to Richmond but I remained in my seat in the interval and found the many, many reviews for the Brighton run - a couple of glowing reviews (which had been bumped to the front page) but the rest were utterly scathing, and entirely accurate. A number of people didn't return after the interval - I decided to stay in the hope that it might improve. Nope. Catherine Tate got a few laughs for some out-of-kilter-with-act-one comedy - but it was dire. 

It's the script. It's abysmal. The cast know it's abysmal - their faces at the curtain call, my God. They looked (rightly) mortified. You can rehearse as much as you like, but if the material is very poor, there's only so much you can do with it.

Press night has been delayed by over a month - astonishing. I fail to see how this can be redeemed without junking the script entirely and getting in a competent playwright.

The reviews I've read online are totally honest and accurate (from what I saw myself) and the people leaving these reviews are seasoned and articulate theatregoers, so they know what they're talking about.

I really feel for the cast and crew - this is an absolute turkey.

Surely the best bet for this show is for it to become a cult show for being so horrendous.

They should do a play about it.

The Curse of the Enfield Haunting.

Travel from Brighton, to Richmond and then to the West End as you discover the true story of a cursed play depicting the true story of the cursed House in Enfield.

lighting.

Are you a masochist?