Ivories

By Riley Elton McCarthy

June 2024, Backstage Theatre

Back ‘home’ to help his sick grandmother, Sloane sinks into the play they’re desperate to finish. His husband and best friend are desperate to help, but as tension bleeds into the walls, the Neighbour watches and waits. A basement holds more than just memories… This production of Ivories makes the haunted house a site of visceral trans horror.

As part of Mountview’s Director Showcase 2024, a public production of horror theatre with an all trans and non-binary cast. It explored queerness, reclamation of body horror, and how we can make visceral horror with accessible practice for both creatives and audiences.

Ivories was an experiment in creating accessible horror theatre. Prior to the show, I had created a detailed content warnings guide and sonic story. As audiences arrived, there were QR codes and hard copies available if they wanted more information regarding the nature of the performance, as well as non-spoiler content warnings available on screens.

The performances were live captioned, and we had sessions with BSL consultancy for moments of characters signing. As a disabled, neurodiverse director, working with a disabled team, it meant a lot to be able to reach out to disabled audiences and help make this a show they could engage with.

Horror has been a genre where I’ve often been told or assumed that I can’t engage with it, while I’ve found that it is one of the most consistently content warned genres, with a supportive, queer fanbase. It has been a joy to see how we could bring the excitement of new trans voices in horror to the stage, and what horror theatre can look like with accessible practice.