Theatre Mill to stage Frankenstein Revelations at York Medical Society

Enter, and the walls are lined by cabinets of medical specimens, leading to a library just as an antiquarian library should be. There sit Theatre Mill producer Rebecca Stafford, South Yorkshire writer-director Nick Lane and leading man Richard Keightley, gathered to introduce the York company's latest site-specific production, the gothic science-fiction drama Frankenstein Revelations.

Last year, Theatre Mill turned the York Guildhall into a Hull trawlermen's pub cum whaling ship for Moby Dick, while past locations have included the Mansion House for The Importance Of Being Earnest; the Guildhall Council Chamber for Agatha Christie's Witness For The Prosecution; Treasurer's House for Sherlock Holmes And The Speckled Band and the Merchant Adventurers' Hall for The Strange Case Of Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde.

Once more, Rebecca Stafford has found a previously uncharted space to stage a theatrical production, this time at the York Medical Society from February 2 to 25. "It's the same situation that applied to quite a few of our shows," she says. "This is the first time that the York Medical Society have allowed a theatre group into their rooms, and this production has been in the pipeline for well over a year now, maybe 18 months.

Meet The Monster in Theatre Mill's Frankenstein Revelations. Picture: Tom Jackson

"I met the committee, who are all doctors, and they were all in favour after I went to a committee meeting, as they'd been a little trepidatious, but I was able to put their minds at rest as we have built up a reputation from doing shows in other unexpected places. So, it was all about reassuring them about us, and some of them had seen previous Theatre Mill shows, which is always helpful.

"We're very excited about the location and because it's a new commission of the Frankenstein story, the Medical Society were excited to find out what it would involve, so members will be coming to a performance."

Rebecca could not be happier with the setting, the Medical Society's lecture hall, and with the drama that lies in store in Nick Lane's adaptation of Mary Shelley's novel. "I've always wanted Theatre Mill to do Frankenstein because it's full of tension and atmosphere, and this is the perfect place for it: a hidden gem that no-one knows about, so hopefully people will be excited to have a look."

Rebecca's next task was to find the right writer and director. Step forward Nick Lane, formerly of Hull Truck Theatre, well known to York Theatre Royal audiences and Reform Theatre devotees too and purveyor of Yorkshire's best children's show of 2016: Pinocchio at the Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, last month.

Richard Keightley's Victor Frankenstein in Frankenstein Revelations. Picture: Tom Jackson

Writer-director Lane can turn his hand and turn of phrase equally adroitly to confessional family dramas, children's plays and adaptations of such heavyweight works as Moby Dick, The Strange Case Of Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde, Lady Chatterley's Lover and George Orwell's 1984.

"When Rebecca first got in touch with me via Juliet Forster at York Theatre Royal to say she was looking for someone to do Frankenstein, it took me back to the first play I'd written for Hull Truck in 2000 when I was 28: Frankenstein!" says Nick "Zach Lee was in it, who's in this production too, and so was Stuart Wade [now a fixture in the Grand Opera House panto in York], but it was over-written, trying to be true to the book to the point of stifling my own creativity. I wasn't brave enough or experienced enough to let myself take control of it. Now, it's 17 years later and I'd like to think I've improved."

Once commissioned, Nick set about writing a completely fresh version, creating two treatments, one contemporary, the other, the version that now forms Frankenstein Revelations: a claustrophobic, scary, intense three-hander.

"Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein in 1818 and set it at the end of the 1790s, but I've decided to move it to 1866 as I wanted to use a war setting to trap the characters in Ingolstadt, and the only war I could find was the Austro-Prussian War that lasted only four months in 1866," says the writer-director.

In Lane's version of Shelley's psychological thriller, the city is torn apart by Prussian cannon fire. A lone figure staggers through the ruins of the once proud university; screaming at the top of his lungs, he collapses at the feet of an ambitious physician, Dr Gerber (Zach Lee) and a skittish nurse, Agatha (Viktoria Kay). His name is Victor Frankenstein, and while the world outside burns, Dr Frankenstein tells his two new companions the most incredible story they have ever heard. Did he truly defy God and create life? Or is Frankenstein hiding an even more deadly secret?

Richard Keightley will play Frankenstein, tripping on hallucinogenic stimulants and painkillers, and spinning around him, Lee and Kay will play everyone else.

"I've done research on dissociative identity disorder, or multiple personality disorder, previously when I was in Shelagh Stephenson's play Enlightenment last year at Keswick, which was one way of interpreting the character I was playing, and with the themes that Nick has highlighted for this play, it's been useful again," says Richard.

Nick has the final word: "Before the Victorians got hold of Frankenstein and turned it into gothic horror, it was a tragedy, a story of man versus God, that's actually very sad. Last time I concentrated on the tragedy but this time I want to make people jump too."

Theatre Mill present Frankenstein Revelations at York Medical Society, 23 Stonegate, York, from February 2 to 25, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Thursday and Saturday matinees. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

The Press Readers Offer: 10% off standard ticket price on February 2 to 9 performances. Quote Revelations1 at the point of booking at York Theatre Royal. Offer expires on January 27.