Zombie Joe's Underground Theatre's URBAN DEATH Enters Open Run at the Players Theatre
By: Faetra Petillo
Zombie Joe’s Underground Theatre Group strikes Greenwich Village like a lightning-bolt with URBAN DEATH - their ultimate and timely theatrical horror production. URBAN DEATH blends classic Grand Guignol Theatre with brisk European Tableaux technique, with modern dance choreography, with the trials and tribulations of the two-bit daily grind… into one chilling hour-long spin-cycle of late-night terrifying fun at The Players Theatre. URBAN DEATH winds a dark trail of 36 fast and frightening vignettes, executed with such high-impact, extreme blood-curdling ferocity – all free from the bondage of wordy dialogue.
Andy Webster of The New York Times describes URBAN DEATH: “It begins with a mound of ghoul-like bodies awakening in an empty space and morphs into a procession of tableaus, many of them digs at show business: slow-moving male bodybuilders flex freakishly; three barely clad lovers entwine in a spotlight, like porn stars; a homeless woman pleading for attention is attacked by a masked assailant; models pose as if for a Vanity Fair cover although they resemble corpses; a man, his head encased in plastic, suspends from a rope, a still life of autoerotic fatality.”Mr. Webster praises URBAN DEATH “for first-rate makeup…costumes and sheer, vital stagecraft. There may be many spooky stage productions around this Halloween, but few will approach the level of this one.”And Michael Mraz of NYTheatre.com describes URBAN DEATH as “giving the audience a taut hour-long thrill-ride through more than 30 wordless horror vignettes…This show deserves a packed audience, if not for its clever adaptation of horror for the stage, then for the overall atmosphere”.Videos