Hidden away under Waterloo Station is the Vault Festival, the perfect venue for some theatrical horror. The dank smell seeps from the cold bricks, smoke curls into the air and we settle into pews for a ghost story.
Bête Noire Productions have created a piece of theatre - part slideshow, part dramatisation - that spins a chilling yarn out of a true story. Writers and performers Tom Worsley and Sasha Roberts have pieced together a number of sources on an unsolved murder case from West Germany, 1973. A possessed heretical woman. A devil child. Ghostly apparitions. And a haunted priest.
How much of the story is actually true is known only to the writers, but the performance begins by asking the audience if we believe in god, the devil, or the supernatural. It's just enough to get us into the mood, even if tying the production into a "post-truth" world is a bit of a stretch.
Really it's just a great piece of eerie storytelling. Worsley and Roberts alternate between addressing the audience with the facts and acting out key scenes. They are gripping storytellers, luring us into this world steadily until we're utterly hooked into this unique production.
The archways of the Vault Festival aren't quite the ideal venue. Performed in traverse staging, it's awkward for the audience craning their necks to the side, while the amount of fog is excessive - something even the performers comment on dryly.
Best of all, though, you'll leave the show with your head swimming with ideas, ready to research conspiracy theories. The show's atmosphere creeps up on you, even if it leaves you more intrigued than truly frightened.
4/5
Watch: Father Of Lies runs at the Vault Festival until March 4th.
