Folk Horror, Midlands Arts Centre – Review

Dedicated to producing plays with a ‘Victorian’ flavour – adaptations of detective and horror literature that have a touch of the macabre – Don’t Go Into The Cellar theatre company’s latest show focuses on ‘folk horror’. Performed by writer/creator Jonathan Goodwin and dressed in the pre-20th century attire, the character of McLaird divulges to the audience three tales that deftly peel back the layers of the modern, rationalist world to reveal the primal fears that still reside in the collective unconscious. As McLaird, Goodwin spends some time interacting with the audience – often with understated moments of mirth. But as the character of McLaird ‘gets down to business’, Goodwin takes on the personas of the characters who tell their ‘tales of woe’. McLaird as a character is Scottish and confident, so Goodwin’s shift to ‘Arthur Jefferson’ – a plain-speaking middle-aged accountant – brings a noticeable shift of energy to the proceedings. The reason the first tale works so well is that…