But what of the characters? I went back to my childhood and teenage years and found my rogues gallery in some of my favourite films. As I was writing each character I had these actors and some of their portrayals in mind, some of them are an amalgamation of more than one actor - it's my imagination, I'm allowed! I hasten to add here that the actors that are playing the characters in the play are NOT doing impressions of them. Each performance is owned and lived in by the actors onstage, a product of their wonderful craft and skill and direction - it's been a lot of fun in rehearsal working with this talented bunch.
The actors all named below were in my mind when I was writing, and there were qualities of others (again listed elsewhere) but these few below kept popping up, they were iconic models for me to hang action and dialogue on, and all this a good while before I finally cast the play. I shared my time with these silver screen icons who freaked me out regularly between the hours of midnight and four in the morning on each writing session, a good ghost story should be written around that time don't you think? That's when I did all of my writing on this.
Doctor Roy Earle
Vivian Ruttledge
Cairo
Adolphus Scarabus
Vincent De Lambré
There's a broader nod to Vincent Price elsewhere in the show, see if you can spot it...or hear it perhaps...? Ah ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!