HP Lovecraft Festival Hits New York

Events carrying on H.P. Lovecraft's cosmic horror are spreading like Cthulhu's extra-dimensional tentacles. Portland, Providence, and Phoenix have earned their eldritch stripes by hosting HPL themed festivities in recent memory. Now, New York City is due to hold the H.P. Lovecraft Festival from March 17, 2011 - April 3, 2011. The weekend anchored shows consist of live performances of six Lovecraft stories by Radio Theatre. Here's the rundown:

PROGRAM A: MAR 17, 18, 19, 31 APR 2 @ 8pm MAR 20 @ 4pm
PICKMAN'S MODEL - Just how does the artist Pickman get such remarkable detail in his horrifying paintings?
DAGON - a man is shipwrecked on a strange island where he finds a lost world of fish people.
FROM BEYOND - a mad scientist goes where no man has gone before.
THE BEAST IN THE CAVE - a lost cave explorer is attacked by something in the dark.

PROGRAM B: MAR 24, 25, 26 APR 1 @ 8pm APR 3 @ 4pm
THE DUNWICH HORROR - A seminal work in Lovecraft's famous Cthulu Mythos wherein a backwoods family worships the ancient ones who will return one day to destroy mankind.
THE MUSIC OF ERICH ZANN - a weird pianist plays maddening music that is indescribable.

The group plans to continue further Lovecraftian performances in the fall.  Lovecraft inspired live dramas are a small, but growing trend, possibly prompted by the audio recordings of the past, such as Dark Adventure Radio's At the Mountains of Madness. However, theater goes one step further by giving full visual and audio life to Lovecraft's horrors.


Tickets are available through the H.P. Lovecraft Festival page, and start at $18 per event, with specials to see all six performances for a bargain. Ironically, Lovecraft loathed New York City, but perhaps the theater event can double as a sort of exorcism, banishing the grim tension between his Cyclopean artistic vision and the City that Never Sleeps.


-Grim Blogger