David Radford as the Dr. and Rod Peter Jr. as the Mr. in The Strange Case of Dr.Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

Credit: Ariel Rubin

Creepy Craigdarroch

Giggling Iguana celebrates 10 haunting years

A decade into Giggling Iguana’s extremely successful Halloween performances at Craigdarroch Castle, it’s hard to believe the spooky shows almost never saw the light of the autumn moon. But, according to company founder Ian Case, his original stage adaptation of Edgar Allen Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher was sitting on the backburner for awhile before making its debut 10 years ago. The original site for the show—a local historic house—fell through (“We were getting all ready to go and unfortunately the fellow died, so we couldn’t go in,” says Case) and Craigdarroch—where Case was producing Christmas theatre programming—wasn’t interested in hosting Halloween shows.

“They weren’t really related, but I decided not to do the Christmas programming and they didn’t have a very good year the year I didn’t do it,” recalls Case. “So they came to me the next year and said, ‘Please come back,’ so I said, ‘Well, I’ll come back, but you have to let me do the Halloween show.’”

The rest, as they say, is history. The Fall of the House of Usher debuted with four sold-out performances and the future of Giggling Iguana’s Halloween plays was solidified. Ten years later, virtually the entire run of Halloween shows sells out (so get tickets for this year early, folks) and they have led to other holiday performances at Victoria’s famed historical landmark. Five different spooky plays—House of Usher, War of the Worlds, I Might be Edgar Allen Poe, A Picture of Dorian Gray and this year’s The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde—have haunted Craigdarroch’s halls, with more site-specific adaptations to come.

Case says the Halloween shows have developed a very loyal following, with many audience members returning year after year. He says he even has a group of 12 people coming up from Seattle to see this year’s production.

“They plan their fall holiday to come up and see the show,” he says. “It seems to attract people who really want to stick with it and come and see how we’re going to do things next year.”

So, what does he think it is about the Halloween shows that strike a chord with people?

“When I started doing these things, there was very little in the way of adult Halloween activity. I think people had parties and there were some large-scale Halloween spook nights, but those were really geared towards teenagers and less towards adults. This, like a masked ball or something like that, is a very adult-oriented Halloween experience,” he says. “You get to explore your dark side and have fun doing it, but not have to go somewhere where you either drink your face off and run around a corn maze—not to denigrate those experiences.”

And while the appeal of a more grown-up Halloween activity does indeed contribute to the Craigdarroch shows’ success, the calibre of the productions likely doesn’t hurt, either. From creating a script that fully utilizes the castle’s unique setting to some great casting choices, there’s much to like about these shows beyond a chance to get a bit spooked for Halloween.

In previous years, Case himself has adapted the scripts, but this year’s production of The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde was crafted by Christina Patterson and David Radford, who have performed in the Craigdarroch shows the past four years. It’s the husband-and-wife team’s first-ever adaptation, but Patterson says having worked in the castle space for the last few years—and knowing its unique challenges, such as long flights of stairs and having to move the audience from room to room—has helped the process.

“We really went through and planned the scenes in the script, rather than just writing a script and then hoping to fit it into the castle,” says Patterson, who got the idea to adapt the Robert Louis Stevenson tale after hearing a tape of it being read by Malcolm McDowell of Clockwork Orange fame. “There’s a lot of people who come to the castle year after year and they see the same spots in the castle, because some bits of the castle are off-limits for the shows. So part of the exciting thing is trying to find new ways of using the castle.”

Radford and Patterson—who were involved in the original proposed production of House of Usher, but moved to Toronto for a few years before returning to Victoria—aren’t the only Jekyll and Hyde cast members who have worked in Craigdarroch before. Both Paul Terry and Rod Peter Jr. have graced the castle’s stairs in past years.

“I’m always looking for new people who can get involved, but I definitely like to work with people that I know and that I like or love because it’s a good time,” Case says of his casting choices. “Iguana is run as a commercial theatre company; we have no subsidy whatsoever and the entire thing is run off box office. We work as a professional co-op and everybody takes away an equal share from the box office. We’re making a little bit of beer money, essentially, but we’re having a lot of fun doing it. That’s the key; if it’s not fun, I don’t want to be doing it. That’s what I say to my cast: If you’re not having fun, something is wrong.”

Peter says he was cast in 2004’s War of the Worlds after Case saw him in a Fringe show.

“There’s no auditioning with Ian,” he says. “He sees you, he likes what you’ve done and he goes, ‘I have an idea for you’ and he adds you into this family.”

Indeed, there seems to be a real sense of camraderie within the group. While handing over a freshly adapted script to a director who happens to be a close friend—and then turning around and being directed by said friend—could be a recipe for disaster, Patterson says that hasn’t been an issue.

“We’re starting to, as we get older, know when to take and when to give,” she says. “We went into it with the idea that we’re going to write it and give it to him and we’re not going to be precious about it. If he disagrees or wants to make changes, then we’re going to suck it up and agree to that. He came in with the exact same attitude from the directing approach.”

Patterson is playing the role of Miss Poole and Radford is taking on Dr. Jekyll, while Peter is portraying Mr. Hyde.

“The goal is, by the end of the show, to have people not want to speak to me,” Peter says. “Rather than being like, ‘Wow, that was spooky. Let’s go for drinks!’ I’d rather people see me on the street and say, ‘I don’t want to speak to that guy. I know he played that character, but I still find him creepy.’”

Sounds like he’s taking Case’s comments about exploring our dark sides pretty seriously. M

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The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Opens 8pm Thursday, October 15 To October 31
Craigdarroch Castle, 1050 Joan
Tickets $22-$25 (advance only)
250-592-5323