By Mikaela STONE

As Halloween approaches, the Crescenta Valley High School Theater Dept. prepared for the spooky season with a double feature theater experience by the Falcon Players and CV Players, CVHS’s two advanced theater classes.

On Oct. 11 and 12, the cast and crew members performed Dracula, adapted by William McNulty and directed by Brent Beerman, and Vintage Hitchcock: A Live Radio Play directed by Amy Matalas. The production of Dracula follows a recent resurgence in the penny dreadful’s popularity due to the free email newsletter sweeping the internet. Dracula Daily follows Bram Stoker’s epistolary style by sending a daily email from May 3 to Nov. 7 with the letters, newspaper articles and diary entries the Dracula characters write each day. This year, Re: Dracula, a podcast narrating the story along with the newsletter, has further increased the phenomenon.

While William McNulty’s adaption takes heavy liberties with Stoker’s original story, the student actors gave engaging and delightfully dark performances. Everyone involved was dedicated, from the lead actors to the walking dead that chased Jonathan Harker through the grounds of Dracula’s estate to the chilling laugh of Ben Hays’ Dracula.

The CV players performed Vintage Hitchcock: A Live Radio Play as a proper radio show, creating many of the sounds through practical effects, such as cracking two pieces of wood together to replicate a gunshot and dropping a bag of fertilizer for the sound of a falling body – all under the direction of student director Ciel St. Dennis. Director Amy Matalas expressed how proud she was of her students; as a voice actor herself, she was able to help students grow their own voice talents. It was her belief that “having a lot of restrained movement allowed them to build their characters from the inside out rather than the outside in.” The “richer, more textured” sounds, such as explosions and music, came from the tech crew under the lead of Odina Dominguez or, as her students call her, Mama D.

Having two opening nights on the same day was difficult, but Dominguez and her team pulled it off.

“Both [shows were] very tech heavy, one being light cue heavy, which was Dracula, versus Radio Hitchcock, which was sound heavy,” said Dominguez.

The dedication by all involved was evident in creating the double feature and makes supporters ask what the future holds for the students of Crescenta Valley High School.