Monsters are fragmentary, uncertain, frightening creatures. What happens when they enter the realm of the theatre? The Monster in Theatre History explores the cultural genealogies of monsters as they appear in the recorded history of Western theatre. From the Ancient Greeks to the most cutting-edge new media, Michael Chemers focuses on a series of ‘key’ monsters, including Frankenstein’s creature, werewolves, ghosts, and vampires, to reconsider what monsters in performance might mean to those who witness them. This volume builds a clear methodology for engaging with theatrical monsters of all kinds, providing a much-needed guidebook to this fascinating hinterland.

The ‘macabre’, as a process and product, has been haunting the theatre – and more broadly, performance – for thousands of years. In its embodied meditations on death and dying, its thematic and aesthetic grotesquerie, and its sensory-rich environments, macabre theatre invites artists and audiences to trace the stranger, darker contours of human existence. In this volume, numerous scholars explore the morbid and gruesome onstage, from freak shows to the French Grand Guignol; from Hell Houses to German Trauerspiel; from immersive theatre to dark tourism, stopping along the way to look at phantoms, severed heads, dark rides, haunted mothers and haunting children, dances of death and dismembered bodies. From Japan to Australia to England to the United States, the global macabre is framed and juxtaposed to understand how the theatre brings us face to face with the deathly and the horrific.

Constructing 'Monsters' in Shakespearean Drama and Early Modern Culture argues for the crucial place of the 'monster' in the early modern imagination. Burnett traces the metaphorical significance of 'monstrous' forms across a range of early modern exhibition spaces - fairground displays, 'cabinets of curiosity' and court entertainments - to contend that the 'monster' finds its most intriguing manifestation in the investments and practices of contemporary theatre. The study's new readings of Shakespeare, Marlowe and Jonson make a powerful case for the drama's contribution to debates about the 'extraordinary body'.

The 1931 Universal Pictures film adaptation of Frankenstein directed by James Whale and starring Boris Karloff as the now iconic Monster claims in its credits to be 'Adapted from the play by Peggy Webling'. Webling's play sought to humanize the creature, was the first stage adaptation to position Frankenstein and his creation as doppelgängers, and offered a feminist perspective on scientific efforts to create life without women, ideas that suffuse today's perceptions of Frankenstein's monster. The original play script exists in several different versions, only two of which have ever been consulted by scholars; no version has ever been published. Nor have scholars had access to Webling's private papers and correspondence, preserved in a family archive, so that the evolution of Frankenstein from book to stage to screen has never been fully charted. In Peggy Webling and the Story behind Frankenstein, Dorian Gieseler Greenbaum (Webling's great grandniece) and Bruce Graver present the full texts of Webling's unpublished play for the first time. A vital critical edition, this book includes: - the 1927 British Library Frankenstein script used for the first production of the play in Preston, Lancashire - the 1928 Frankenstein script in the Library of Congress, used for productions in UK provincial theatres from autumn 1928 till 1930 - the 1930 Frankenstein Prompt Script for the London production and later provincial performances, held by the Westminster Archive, London - Webling's private correspondence including negotiations with theatre managers and Universal Pictures, family letters about the writing and production process, and selected contracts - Text of the chapter 'Frankenstein' from Webling's unpublished literary memoir, The Story of a Pen for additional context - Biography of Webling that bears directly on the sensibilities and skills she brought to the writing of her play - History of how the play came to be written and produced - The relationship of Webling's play to earlier stage and film adaptations - An exploration of playwright and screenwriter John L. Balderston's changes to Webling's play and Whale's borrowings from it in the 1931 film Offering a new perspective on the genesis of the Frankenstein movie, this critical exploration makes available a unique and necessary 'missing link' in the novel's otherwise well-documented transmedia cultural history.

Duck Macatarsney cares for her biker dad, Duke, whose MS is getting worse. Duke is a spliff-smoking (for medicinal reasons you understand), bike-riding, heavy-metal- and horror-movie-loving, pizza-eating widower who has brought up Duck since the death of her mum in a crash. The two of them are just about surviving when one morning the Duke wakes up blind and the Duck hears Social Services are coming to take her away.The Monster in the Hall follows Duck as she tries to protect her world from the terrifying prospect of change.David Greig's The Monster in the Hall premiered at the Citizens Theatre, Glasgow, in autumn 2010, and was staged at the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh in 2011 as part of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Revised 2016 Edition. She Kills Monsters tells the story of Agnes Evans as she leaves her childhood home in Ohio following the death of her teenage sister, Tilly. When Agnes finds Tilly’s Dungeons & Dragons notebook, however, she finds herself catapulted into a journey of discovery and action-packed adventure in the imaginary world that was her sister’s refuge. In this high-octane dramatic comedy laden with homicidal fairies, nasty ogres, and ’90s pop culture, acclaimed playwright Qui Nguyen offers a heart-pounding homage to the geek and warrior within us all.

Sixteen original essays by leading scholars on Mary Shelley's novel provide an introduction to Frankenstein and its various critical contexts.