Uncanny – Alhambra Theatre, Bradford

Writer: Danny Robins

Principal: Sam Hodges

On the back of his phenomenally popular podcast, TV show and book, Danny Robins returns with his live show Strange.

Robins greets the audience as if they were old friends and clearly there is a strong and supportive community here, a mix of some ‘skeptics’ and plenty of ‘believers’. Audiences can’t wait to delve into his new stories and explore their paranormal potential, and Robins never fails to deliver, taking on the role of narrator and joining his team of experts, “skeptic” Chris French and “believer” Evelyn Hollow. .

Robins, as a storyteller, keeps the audience engaged with his atmospheric stories mixed with the practical insights of experts. The main story is of Matthew and Lisa, who live above the plumbing shop where Matthew works. Through interviews, lighting and stage effects, we reveal their disturbing paranormal experience piece by piece. The audience weighs in as the story unfolds, adding their theories and questions as they try to solve the mystery, although the regular use of screams, shouts and lighting bursts into this main narrative, which has an air of the thinly veiled macabre, more rather than a real life experience.

Later we hear a second story about a family frightened by the untimely death of their neighbors. While this is, on some levels, a more believable story than the first, again the reliance on theatrics detracts from what could be an emotionally rich, carefully curated story if the show had pursued genuine truth-seeking over theatrics . At times, the performative elements seem to trivialize the content and take away from Robins’ natural ability to hold the audience in the palm of his hand with his storytelling.

The set generally works well, the eerie lighting woven into bare tree branches against an eerie forest, setting up all the usual tropes of scary stories to come. The use of a simple door is a flexible and flexible mechanism to take the audience to different times and places.

There’s an interesting segment later in the show where audience members tell their own ghost stories, and it’s in the space where the work feels most authentic and where there’s real opportunity for expansion. Your reviewer would take Robins standing on the edge of an empty stage talking to the audience about their experiences over theme park effects any day if you really want to turn this skeptic into a believer.

Reviewed June 8, 2024. On tour until July 22.