Kindling (Vigil Backstage)

We rub our characters together to create some sparks.

Coming next on 18 April – Vigil: The Great Fire, Act 2

Programme notes

This production contains violence (including gun violence), possession, and death by fire.

Our promo this episode is for Monster Hour, a narrative-driven actual play podcast that combines equal parts comedy and horror with crisp production value and original scoring. Season 2 of Monster Hour steps through the looking glass and into surreal suburban town of Somewhere (USA?). Join Claire, Duncan, and Max as they navigate a rambunctious community, fiendish bureaucracy, outlandish adversaries, and plenty of entropic horrors in this Absurdia actual play.

Dramatis personae and other definitions

Persephone ‘Percy’ Byron: A Victorian monster hunter and half-sister of Ada Lovelace. Percy tried to time travel from 1852 to 1666 to stop the summoning of an apocalyptic demon, but something went wrong, and she landed in present-day Sherrydown instead.

Mick Mason: Sherrydown’s favourite builder and bricklayer. His life has been getting weirder since he dug too deep and hit a leyline.

Brier: A mischievous shapeshifting púca, the fae guardian of Sherrydown’s Rosebrier Forest.

Ed Kincaid: a once promising, now disgraced MI5 agent assigned to investigate the more … esoteric threats reported to the national security hotline.

Department of Omissions (DO, DoOm): The UK government department tasked with preventing harm to citizens from supernatural phenomena. Severely defunded under Tory austerity policies and currently prioritising major urban population centres.

Sherrydown, Brackshire: A historic English market town. One of the first towns to lose its DoOm office.

Omission effect: The rejection of certain beings and phenomena by long-term memory. Can be suppressed by concentration, mnemonic techniques, hypnosis, trauma, or the light of the full moon.

Credits

COMPERE: Matt Boothman

STARRING:

  • Ellie Pitkin as Percy Byron, the Exile

  • Dave as Mick, the Mundane

  • Strat as Brier, the Monstrous

  • Chris MacLennan as Kincaid, the Professional

ROLEPLAYING GAME SYSTEM: Monster of the Week, designed by Michael Sands

MUSIC BY: Alexander Pankhurst

SOUND DESIGN BY: Matt Boothman

EDITED AND PRODUCED BY: Matt Boothman

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