Scottish playwright and storyteller Marty Ross has
rewritten three of Edgar Allan Poe’s supernatural short stories, relocating
them to contemporary Scotland.
In the one I saw, The Fall of the House of Usher has been
re-imagined as a fable set in the world of contemporary art.
Thus Roderick and Madeleine Usher become a brother and
sister pair of conceptual artists, of the shark-in-formaldehyde school, and the
Usher mansion is a fabulous, ultra-modern duplex on the banks of the Clyde.
Ross has a great aptitude for suspense and terror, and he
hurls himself into his tale with energy and passion, in words which ring with
the native Glasgow rhythm.
Sometimes the intensity is a bit too much, but this is an
accomplished piece of work which builds towards a chilling conclusion.
Lovers of Poe may also want to seek out Ross’s other two
adaptations – The Tell-Tale Heart, reset among drug dealers on a Glasgow
scheme, and Ligeia, relocated to the Glasgow punk scene.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: only a member of this blog may post a comment.