One of the stories covered in Shuddersome: Tales of Poe is The Masque of the Red Death. In this story, guests at a masked ball are overcome by the dread “Red Death”, a disease that is spreading throughout the land. The death is marked by sudden bleeding from every orifice.
The premiere production (Listowel District Secondary School) solved this problem by making double-sided masks. The plain white side is the side the guests wore at the beginning, then the masks were flipped to reveal the bleeding on the other side. Here’s a photo and some video showing how it’s done:
I love this simple and theatrical solution!
Transcript
Okay. Here is an awesome thing that they did in Poe. They had a mask, Masque of Red Death, right? Everyone bleeds out their eyes, this is a dollar store mask that they covered with duct tape, white duct tape, everyone’s in the mask, everyone’s at the party, the red death comes, all they do is flip it around and they’re dying. Dollar store, you can do anything in a dollar or less. I love this effect. Awesome!
adapted by Lindsay Price Canadian Author from Edgar Allan Poe
A vivid and theatrical adaptation of some of Poe's best known works. Multi length versions to fit every performance need.
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