![]() “Grey House” could be staged in such a way that the play begins with a semblance of normalcy and then slowly get weird. And what are those things hanging from the ceiling? Rabid bats? Discarded fetuses? Natasha Katz’s lighting is so sparse that we never know for sure, but during several longueurs to come, those suspended objects do give us something to contemplate. Scott Pask’s creepy set all but reeks of rot. Even earlier, as the curtain ascends in the totally dark theater, there is Tom Gibbons’s sound design that never stops punctuating the air with creaking wood and blowing wind and moaning humans. “Grey House” starts scary with that big boot being dropped into a pile of other big boots. Written by Levi Holloway, this new horror play under the direction of Joe Mantello opened Thursday on Broadway at the Lyceum Theatre after a 2019 run in Chicago. Everything has not just happened before, it has taken place many, many times before. ![]() ![]() ![]() In other words, what we are about to witness on stage is a ritual. ![]() Early in “Grey House,” one of the five children who live in the blizzard-afflicted cabin of the title removes the boot of a severely injured stranger and carries it downstage, where it is thrown into a basket filled with nearly identical brands of manly footwear. It may be the scariest moment in what is supposed to be a scary play. ![]()
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