Dr and Mrs Bancroft, with daughter Kitty, are visiting an old friend from medical school, who now lives and works with mental patients in a crumbling castle in a part of Germany swarming with wolves. Daughter Kitty is much taken with the dishy Baron - but she ought to have known. .. it’s always the dishy ones you have to look out for…
1890 - Walpurgisdorf, a small village in Germany
The old Baroness is about to be laid to rest in the cemetery of the Walpurgisdorf Church. The pastor objects vehemently, as this is consecrated ground, but the Baron insists, and then collapses at her grave and dies. With the sound of wolf howls surrounding them, the pastor declares the church as desecrated.
1922 - Walpurgisdorf Castle
Dr. Hugo Bancroft, his wife Eunice, their lovely daughter Kitty and D'Arcy their new butler arrive at the castle to visit Dr. Konrad Steiner, an old medical school chum. Arriving at the castle, they meet Ramsey, an eccentric penny whistle-playing, rabbit-eating man who turns out to be a patient of Dr. Steiner. A psychoanalyst, Steiner is doing research on people who think they are lycanthropes.
Ramsey sneaks into Kitty's room during the night and leaves her a penny whistle, which she wakes up and finds. She attempts to play it, and Martin von Heilman walks by her window and hears her. They meet, and he invites Kitty to an ice skating party the next day. D'Arcy is quite jealous, as he is in love with Kitty himself, and is only pretending to be a butler to get close to her. He is actually Lord D'Arcy of Faversham.
While everybody is skating, the one-armed Chief of Police Otto Krueger (he lost his arm as a child) arrives. Otto reveals to the skaters that Martin is actually the current Baron, who has been renting part of the castle to Dr. Steiner. Otto is also obsessed with the concept that werewolves exist, and is constantly trying to prove it. He also scares the guests with stories of a phantom priest who haunts the abandoned church.
During the skating party, a village woman named Frau Gessler shows up with a terrible wound: her hand has been severed in a wolf trap. Dr. Steiner wishes to treat her, but she is hysterical and won't let him touch her, so Dr. Bancroft volunteers. Ernst, a drunken hunter, shows up and proudly declares he has shot a wolf and bagged a paw for bounty. He pulls the paw out of the bag and his horrified audience sees it's a woman's hand.
Dr. Bancroft is treating Frau Gessler, who is showing some increasingly lupine tendencies. She opens the shutters to let the moon in, and is about to attack the good English doctor when Otto and company burst in and confront her with the hand. Otto suspects she is a werewolf and takes her into custody. Steiner visits her and promises to help her before he leaves. Later, Frau Gessler is attacked in her cell and killed by an unknown monster who was able to bend open the prison bars to get to her.
Martin and Kitty are taking a romantic walk in the woods until they stumble across the mutilated body of Ernst the hunter. Martin leaves Kitty alone to fetch Otto, and she nearly drowns in a bog trying to escape a wolf-like animal stalking her. D'Arcy comes to her rescue, and Dr. Steiner points out that Ramsey is probably the killer.
Back at the castle, Steiner declares that everyone is insane, it's just a matter of degree. His experiments in psychoanalysis are just a little left of center, but everyone dismisses his wild theories. Ramsey shows up and is locked up by Ingeborg, Steiner's able assistant. The Bancrofts retire to bed, planning to leave first thing in the morning. Kitty sneaks back downstairs to say goodbye to Martin, but is kidnaped by the werewolf. Her parents, D'Arcy, Otto and Steiner rush to the rescue.
Mrs. Bancroft takes a break while climbing up the abandoned Walpurgisdorf church and is joined by Ramsey, who wants to help with the search. The werewolf has taken Kitty to a cave and is about to attack her when Kitty remembers her whistle and plays it. It soothes the savage beast, until Kitty trips and falls, and the beast breaks the whistle. Ramsey saves Kitty, but he is killed, and the werewolf escapes.
Otto's beliefs are vindicated: everyone must admit that werewolves actually exist. Mrs. Bancroft and Dr. Steiner take Kitty back to the castle while the other men chase after the werewolf. Martin is at the castle, and is all solicitousness over Kitty's harrowing escape. Back at the church, the men have stumbled across the Baroness's grave, and meet up with the ‘ghost', a living man and the very pastor who had officiated at her burial. They find out that Steiner is actually a cousin of the Baroness, who was a werewolf, and so conclude that Steiner is the culprit. They ski madly back to the castle, chased by a wolf pack.
Kitty has jumped from the frying pan into the fire. Steiner and Ingeborg lock her up with their mad plan to create a new race, Lupus Steinerii, with Kitty as the mate for the true werewolf, who is actually Steiner's son by female werewolf. Kitty discovers out that the werewolf is none other than her suitor, Baron Martin von Heilman. Steiner tries to hypnotize Kitty into letting her natural lycanthropic tendencies out (everyone has them, just like everyone is insane), but mistakenly transforms himself into a werewolf instead.
The rescue ski patrol (D'Arcy, Otto and Mr. Bancroft) arrives just as Steiner is about to kill Kitty. Martin then attacks Steiner, upsetting a lantern which sets the castle on fire. Mr. And Mrs. Bancroft, Otto, D'Arcy and Kitty manage to escape as the fire consumes the castle. Steiner and Martin perish in the blaze. The survivors gather outside the castle The sun is rising, and true love and goodness triumph once again.
We’re Going to Have some Fun
A Meeting by Moonlight
Every Walpurgisdorfer Knows
The Moon is Full
Who Needs the Words?
Aucun dossier informatif complémentaire concernant Curse of the Werewolf
Aucun dossier informatif complémentaire concernant Curse of the Werewolf
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Curse of the Werewolf (1994-02-Theatre Royal Stratford East-London)
Type de série: RevivalThéâtre: Theatre Royal Stratford East (Londres - Angleterre) Durée : 1 mois 1 semaine Nombre : Première Preview : 10 February 1994
Première: 10 February 1994
Dernière: 19 March 1994Mise en scène : Ken Hill • Chorégraphie : Lindsay Dolan • Producteur : Star(s) : Avec: Steven Pacey (Old Baron), Robin Nedwell (D’Arcy), Judith Bruce (Mrs Bancroft), Reginald Marsh (Dr Bancroft), Diana Morrison (Kitty), Toni Palmer (Ingeborg), Terence Hardinam (Professor Steiner) Bogdan Kominowski (Inspector Kruger)Commentaires : With yodelling lederhosen-clad chorus boys, and fluffy rabbits and squirrels swaying in the trees, singing along to the music of 19th Century opera composer Carl Zeller and new lyrics by Ken Hill, this was a pantomime-type romp (similar in style to Ken Hill’s “Phantom of the Opera” - the pre-Lloyd Webber version.)
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