Frightening! the Musical

:"Here! Here I am! Come and find me - we'll see who lives in whom!" - Thalassus Vandemeek, Act 2 Scene 5.
Frightening! The Musical is a heavy metal rock opera based on the novel Frightening Moments on Festival Lane by contemporary gothic novellist Harry Fyeing. With a score composed by Berdina Toven of Klangkiller, it's a cult hit beloved by postmodernist critics and fans of loud noises.
==Plot Synopsis ==
Thalassus Vandemeek is a renovator and plasterer who has been hired to help renovate a house on Festival Lane. He recognises quickly that the houses either side of his current job are houses that he has previously worked on (Bad Homes), with one being the scene of an accidental mass poisoning and the other being the site of a double homicide. Vandemeek is let in by the homeowner, a young woman who communicates entirely in sign language and humming. She shows him to the room that needs redecorating, apparently her late mother's room, where the walls and floor are stained with smoke and grease (Mama's Room).
Vandemeek proceeds to rip up the carpeting in the room, revealing faces and symbols carved into the floorboards below (Subcutaneous I). He tears away the boards to find more boards of a darker wood type, and again to find stone flooring. Baffled, he accepts the owner's cup of coffee and asks questions about her family (Hummingbird). After she leaves, he begins to tear away the wallpaper, finding layer after layer of paper and paint until he uncovers a door (Subcutaneous II). Consumed by a sense of dread, he returns to the room to find the door out of the room missing.
Trying to remain calm, Vandemeek eats the lunch he packed himself but finds himself unable to stop thinking of the other houses on the street (Festival Lane). Not only does he agonise over the experience of renovating a murder house, but while looking out of the window, he also recognises other homes, including one as his childhood home, one as the home of his divorced father, and one as the house he is currently in, with himself looking back at him. Gripped in panic, Vandemeek realises that the room has no electrical outlets and is too small to contain a bed, leading him to wonder what kind of room this was (No Bed, No Television).
Vandemeek continues to descend into madness in the room, hearing humming through the walls (Let Me Know), knocking on the other side of the door which turns out to lead back into the room he is in (Terrible Violence) and then proceeding to rip up more of the wallpaper and find photographs of himself, discarded drafts of the novel he planned to write as a teenager, and evidence that something has been stalking him - something that brought him here (I Will Hurt You). After ripping away further layers of wall, he notices that the doppelganger of himself through the window is growing closer, levitating across the street and approaching (Doppelganger). Continuing to rip up layers of paper and photographs, he finds that the deeper parts of wall are made of hair, skin and meat (Subcutaneous III).
The final act of the musical features Vandemeek climbing the walls to rip out the lighting wires, using boards from the floor to cover the windows and door, and attempting to escape via a tunnel in the flesh wall (Shrine). Becoming trapped in the wall via parasitic tendrils, Vandemeek is helpless to stop his doppelganger from approaching. As it approaches him despite his shrieking, the homeowner, her neighbours and her family form a chorus that describes the cannibalistic nature of houses and the way that events change a home (My Beautiful Street). As Vandemeek and his doppelganger merge into one monstrous being, discarded parts of the house are drawn into their form, with the cracking of foundations merging with the chorus's wailing. As Vandemeek absorbs the entirety of Festival Lane into himself, the lights, sound effects and musical accompaniment are abruptly cut, leaving the audience with only darkness and Vandemeek's anguished screaming.
==Reception==
A bizarre and inaccessible piece, Frightening! The Musical was originally unpopular with audiences. Though some critics praised its vision and its interpretation of Fyeing's novel, others were dubious of its rock trappings, dark subject matter and weird non-story. Despite this, it was a hit with die-hard Klangkiller fans, and would later gain a cult following.
==Track List==
#Bad Homes - Vandemeek
#Mama's Room - Vandemeek, Homeowner
#Subcutaneous I - Vandemeek, Chorus
#Hummingbird - Vandemeek, Homeowner, Family
#Subcutaneous II - Vandemeek
#Festival Lane - Vandemeek, Police, Chorus
#No Bed, No Television - Vandemeek, Family
#Let Me Know / Terrible Violence - Vandemeek, Homeowner, Family, Chorus
#I Will Hurt You - Vandemeek
#Doppelganger - Chorus, Echo
#Subcutaneous III - Vandemeek
#Shrine - Vandemeek, Echo
#My Beautiful Street (Finale) - Homeowner, Family, Chorus
==Trivia==
*Although it is uncommon for independent theaters to stage small productions of Frightening, sheet music and scripts can be found for the entire musical (as well as costuming and set-dressing guides) on Toven's personal website, hidden behind a short riddle code.
Category:In universe
Category:Theatre