The now well-known Let the Right One In is not exactly what you’d call traditional Christmas fare. Christmas in the major Dublin theatres usually means panto, BBC-esque adaptations of classic novels (we’re looking at you Anna Karenina and The Old Curiosity Shop) or something lightly comic, like Oscar Wilde. Let the Right One In, on the other hand, is a stage adaptation of Tomas Alfredson’s film (itself an adaptation of the Swedish writer John Advije Lindqvist’s novel) about a boy on the cusp of adolescence in a small Scandinavian town who is befriended by the vampire next door. Oskar, the boy, is bullied by his classmates and is harried at home by his mother, who has raised him on her own since his father left to live with another man. Oskar’s relationship with the young vampire, ambiguously named Eli (it is never specifically stated whether they are of any gender), takes a dark turn as it transpires that Eli and their father are responsible for the grisly series of murders which have occurred in the town.
The aforementioned grisly deaths, I am delighted to report, are executed with wonderfully convincing grisliness. It is rare to see a well-executed death onstage and a combination of well-placed blood packs and life-like death spasms produces a frighteningly realistic effect. The rest of the design is executed with similar polish: Christine Jones’s costumes are nicely specific and her set, a visually stunning snowy woods, creates a beautiful atmosphere. The sound design, so important in horror, also builds suspense in all the right places. However, the great stumbling block of this production, as with so many films adapted for the stage, is the scene transitions, so easily achieved with a camera but more laborious to effect onstage. Steven Hoggett, John Tiffany’s frequent collaborator, is credited as movement director, and while the transitional movement sequences provide an interesting distraction during scene changes, they do feel largely superfluous. The rapid change in scene is also slightly awkward and takes away from the majesty of the snowy forest onstage, when one must imagine almost half the scenes taking place somewhere else.
The piece is nicely acted, with Craig Connolly giving a very touching performance as a boy on the cusp of maturity and Katie Honan playing a very eerie, yet sympathetic, vampire. However, despite the efforts of costume and makeup, the idea that Honan could be “not a girl”, as her character suggests, is faintly ridiculous and doesn’t quite capture the ambiguous sexuality of the central relationship. Nick Dunning is appropriately menacing as Hokan, a disturbing father-figure for Eli who procures human blood for her. Special note should be made of Bob Kelly, who gives a wonderfully natural performance in three smaller parts.
Let The Right One In may not be traditional Christmas fare, but it is an enjoyable two hours, with one excellent shock scare, and a neat bow on McLaren and Murray’s first year at the Abbey.
