KCTribune: Night of the Living Dead rocks the screams!!!

Halloween season is here, and you don’t want to miss the deadly fare at the theater! Night of the Living Dead, presented by The Coterie Theater, is based on the original film of the same title by George Romero and John Russo. Not a lot of plot, but campy gore abounds.

Barbara (Angela Cristantello) and Johnny (Spencer Wilson), brother and sister from out-of-town, have driven a long way to put their yearly flowered cross on their dead dad’s grave in rural Butler County. Suddenly…a zombie eats Johnny’s face!!!! Barbara, whose hair is a 1968 blond half-hive, semi-smarts her way into an abandoned farmhouse just before she loses her mind (though not a hair fell out of place…). Ben (Samuel T. Gaines), an angry guy with a gun and the popping blanks to prove it, tries to calm her down. They smack each other in the face in the stress of the moment, resulting in some classic girl-fainting by babbling Babs. A family appears from the basement…but the little girl has been bit! She has a fever…and a budding appetite for Dad’s delectable arm.

Mayhem ensues. Really. It seriously ensues, with fairly constant, if not hurried, attempts by the zombies to breach the walls of the house. A Brownie slams a bloody box of Girl Scout cookies against the siding. A sickly ballerina searches for sinister sustenance. And Johnny! He’s been tasted and approved and eventually devours dear Barbara. Oh the irony. (I’m sure her blood had a lot of iron in it.)

The coolest character of all was the zombie guitarist, played by Scott Hobart. Bedecked in bedeviled duds and strapped with a wireless guitar rig, Scott roams around the set creating musical commentary and scary moanings with his precarious pick and jangling strings. Very effective at adding atmosphere and an inexpensive, mobile soundtrack for the show.

I enjoyed seeing a troop of cub scouts laughing and screaming along with the performance. Though the zombies walked through the aisles, I never got the feeling any one of them was going to break into my personal space and make me feel uncomfortable. It is a fun Halloween production and the surprise at the end will have the MTV generation laughing even harder than their kids.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars.