Hack
Get Off the Stage Productions
Venue 18
Sugar Swing Ballroom
10019 80 Ave., Edmonton
4 Stars
Horror films and plays are something I stay away from. Too much gratuitous blood-letting for my taste.
However, the strong cast of Hack attracted my attention and surprisingly I discovered the 90-minute production is a powerful reflection of our politically correct times.
Two hack writing partners, Foster and August, retreat to an isolated cabin to pen their next great work. However, the cabin has a history of spooky happenings, unexplainable things that make hair stand on end. Whatever dark powers the cabin possess, the duo want to control and make use of for their next piece of entertainment.
The minute Foster and August arrive, they pile into the booze. In a challenge between over-sized egos, they tear into each other in a game of one-up-manship.
Once people start appearing on the doorstep who look just like characters they’ve imagined, it slowly and painfully dawns on them they’ve lost control of the script.
St. Albert’s Dylan Rosychuk and Madelaine Knight along with Eric Smith, Morgan Grau and Susan Evans deliver some hellishly powerful acting. Add on the fire-and-brimstome dialogue, fast pace, eerie sound effects and this is one production that sucks you in until the blood-spattered finale.
