by Mike Hoban
Mrs. Packard – Written by Emily Mann; Directed by Emily Ranii; Scenic Design by Jon Savage; Lighting Design by Ed Intemann; Costume Design by Chelsea Kerl; Sound Design by Don Tindall. Presented by Bridge Repertory Theatre in a co-production with Playhouse Creatures Theatre Co. of NYC at the Multicultural Arts Center, 41 Second St., Cambridge through April 9
When I was a boy in middle school, I was a huge fan of the B horror films that ran on Saturday afternoon showcases like Creature Double Feature. There weren’t many classics in the “Dracula” or “Frankenstein” vein, but there was plenty of silly dreck like “Attack of the Giant Leeches” and “The Thing That Wouldn’t Die” that were more laughable than frightening. But there was one film that truly did horrify me, and that was “Bedlam”, a low rent Boris Karloff vehicle that told the story of a woman wrongly committed to an insane asylum in Victorian England known as Bedlam – which was depicted as a Hollywood backlot version of Hell on Earth. What made it so terrifying was that while there no traditional movie monsters, Bedlam was a real place, and the monsters were the evil men running the asylum.
