DRACULA: A NEW ROMANTIC COMEDY to Stage One-Night-Only Reading in Brooklyn
The Rat in DUMBO will host the staged reading of the comedy featuring Jonathan Harker and Count Dracula.
For one twilight session only, theater lovers, comedy nerds, and genre fans are invited to an exclusive, high-energy staged reading of a hilarious new adaptation of Dracula. This wild, fast-paced theatrical ride will take over DUMBO's premier creative storefront hotspot, The Rat, on Saturday, June 27, 2026, from 4:00 PM to 7:00 PM.
The reinvention kicks off at a chaotic Transylvania train station. We meet Jonathan Harker, an pathologically optimistic English solicitor who ignores blood-soaked warnings from frantic locals and hitches a ride straight into a trap. Instead of immediate doom, Jonathan finds himself held hostage by Count Dracula for the ultimate indignity: teaching the ancient vampire modern English "lingo" so he can successfully blend into London high society. Adding to the madness is Dracula's bizarre domestic life, shared with his vampire "roommates"—Edwina, Broomhilda, and Keith (a totally normal, hypnotized guy who just handles the household scheduling).
Meanwhile, across the pond in London, Dracula crashes a high-society debut gala. There, he tries to steal Harker's fiancé, Mina, while competing for the spotlight against Lucy Westenra's absurd trio of suitors: a high-born gentleman, a chaotic asylum director, and a literal, gun-toting American cowboy. Naturally, things end with an intense dance number, a loss of supernatural impulse control, and a classic neck-bite.
Act II escalates into absolute, brilliant lunacy. When Lucy falls ill with highly unusual symptoms like "itchy teeth," the eccentric Professor Van Helsing is called in to orchestrate frantic, comedic blood transfusions. What follows is an international, multi-vehicle chase back to Transylvania featuring:
- Vampiric telepathy and garlic-heavy fortresses.
- Emotional warfare inside an undead tomb.
- Mustard-seed combat, exploiting the vampire's ancient, mythical psychological weakness: a compulsive need to stop and count them.
The international cast includes Abdullah Naser (Stella Adler Studios, Wraps & Co); Christian Camilo Diaz (British Colombian Actor/Producer, Stella Adler Studios); Liz Leimkuhler (Atlantic Theater Company, The Gilded Age, Entirely From Memory); Nellie Svensson (Unseen, City Academy, “Silver and Gold” on British Channel 4); Patrick Troy-Brandt (Actor/Producer, Stella Adler Studios); Sarah Lyddan (Succession, Law & Order: SVU, Hartford Stage).
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