Review: (Montreal) Real Dead Ghosts (Fringe)

And the Interest Lies Where...?
by Chad Dembski
@surpriseperform

A couple from New York (they are actually from New York) go on a weekend retreat to get away from the city and confront their relationship to each other. Set in an old cabin in the woods with the husband hoping for a ghost sighting on the trip while the wife has planned out every minute of the trip. Soon their relationship is in obvious tension as they cannot agree upon anything in their itinerary. We get some back story from both sides and news that a job has been lost (or the person fired) but both seem a bit lost in their next direction.  

First-Person: Jonathan A. Goldberg on Real Dead Ghosts (Fringe)

There's Something About a Ghost Story
by Jonathan A. Goldberg

Jonathan A. Goldberg (playwright) has had work seen at HERE, Ars Nova, Dixon Place, The Public Theater and many other venues.  His play The Jew and the Demon won the Rita and Burton Prize for Theater.  His short work was featured at Ephemerama at the Magnet Theater and he won the Israel Baron Award for How to Shoot a Bull Moose. He's had plays developed by the Inkwell in Washington DC and won the 2013 In Process Short Play Festival at Hudson Valley Shakespeare.  His play Sousepaw has received critical acclaim around the country. He is a contributor to #serials at The Flea. He won the 2012 L Magazine short fiction contest and has an MFA in playwrighting from NYU Tisch.

It’s hard to know where ideas come from. It’s a question that gets asked a lot, and most writers like to demur or give a flippant answer. I think it’s because in reality we’re not sure. A play doesn’t come all at once, there might be a few flashes of ideas that I string together and sketch out a plot and characters. We might have a triggering idea or moment, but for me at least a lot of it is writing into the unknown. For this pay, Real Dead Ghosts, my triggering ideas was “ghost stories.”

There’s something about a ghost story. When I was a kid I loved them, and also hated them. They’d keep me up at night and give me pause before opening a door or going to the bathroom. Yet I was also fascinated and would read everything I could from Geff the talking mongoose spirit to the Winchester Mystery House. I was fascinated by the idea of unfinished business and odd hauntings. But as I grew up ghosts seemed less scary than other things like failure or cruelty or being an adult.