Halloween on stage? Here’s where to head
Bay Area companies offer horror-themed shows, ranging from campy to creeped-out
The Bay Area is always up for a Halloween celebration, pretty much year round. So it’s no surprise that there’s usually no dearth of creepy shows popping up to fright and delight intrepid theatergoers. We’ve gathered a few tricky treats from around the Bay for your theatrical grab bag.
“TERROR VAULT” >> New production company Into the Dark presents a choose-your-own-adventure immersive theatrical experience. “Terror Vault” is a 21-and-up interactive haunted house through the abandoned basement of the San Francisco Mint, with a cash bar to steel your nerves and slow your response time, making you easier prey for the horrors that lurk below. For ages 10 and up, “Dead Zone” is a series of zombie tag games to survive the zombie apocalypse. Details: Through Nov. 3; San Francisco Mint, San Francisco; $19.95 (“Dead Zone”), $60 (“Terror Vault”); www.intothedarksf.com.
“TERROR-RAMA III: DEAD THE
WHOLE TIME” >> Awesome Theatre presents a midnight movie-style double feature of world premiere horror one-acts by local playwrights: Artistic director Colin Johnson’s ghost story “The Suffered” and resident artist Claire Rice’s cannibal rom-com “My Cannibal Summer.” The evening comes complete with a gothed-out horror host, Sindie Chopper. Details: Friday-Oct. 27; PianoFight, San Francisco; $25-$30; www. awesometheatre.org
“THE ROCKY HORROR SHOW” >> Before it was a cult midnight movie, Richard O’Brien’s “Rocky Horror” was a gleefully campy stage musical that’s become a tradition in its own right around the Bay. San Francisco’s Ray of Light Theatre is doing it at the Victoria Theatre for a fourth year running, and Santa Rosa’s 6th Street Playhouse is now in its sixth year. Details: Friday-Nov. 3; 6th Street Playhouse, Santa Rosa; $30-$36; w w w.6thstreetplayhouse.com; Oct. 25-Nov. 3; Victoria Theatre, San Francisco; $20-$40; www. rayoflighttheatre.com
“THE ADDAMS FAMILY” >> The creepy, kooky and altogether ooky, lovingy macabre family of comic strip, TV and movie fame comes to life in the Broadway musical, courtesy of Rohnert Park’s Spreckels Theatre Company. Details: Friday-Oct. 28; Spreckels Performing Arts Center, Rohnert Park; $18-$36; 707-588-3400, www.spreckelsonline.com “NORTH BY NORTHLOBSTER” >> San Francisco sketch comedy outfit Killing My Lobster sets its claws on all the tropes of Alfred Hitchcock in an evening of chiller thriller parody hilarity at PianoFight. Director (and KML artistic director) Allison Page will stick with the terror theme in late November with “Vampire Christmas,” her full-length comedy cowritten with Stuart Bousel, at the nearby EXIT Theatre. Details: Oct. 18-27; PianoFight, San Francisco;
$10-$50; www.killingmylobster.com.
“DRACULA” >> Physical theater ensemble
Theatre Lunatico resurrects the lord of the undead in a North Berkeley pizza-parlor basement in Bram Stoker’s enduring
horror classic in the stage adaptation by Steven Dietz. Hayward’s Douglas Morrisson Theatre will have the next dance with Drac (presumably the Transylvania Twist) in mid-November. Details: Oct. 18-Nov. 18; La Val’s Subterranean Theater, Berkeley; $15-$25; draculalunatico.bpt.me
“THE LIEUTENANT OF INISHMORE”
>> Though Martin McDonagh’s pitch-black comedy set in rural Ireland isn’t horror-themed per se, it sure is horrific in its copious bloodshed. An ultraviolent tale about a volatile Irish freedom fighter from an IRA splinter group coming home to avenge his dead cat, it’s both hilarious and more grisly than your average slasher flick, especially when the bone saws come out. Details: Through Oct. 21; San Jose Stage Company; $30-$65; 408-283-7142, www.thestage.org