Dreams in the Witch House

You know you’re in for a gruesome treat when your program lists a “biological effects” designer alongside the fight choreographer. Here’s a show where the blueprint of whose blood spews from which orifice achieves an awe-inspiring intricacy, almost rivaling that of Sweeney Todd.

Yet for all its bloody brilliance, Dreams suffers from a case of clunky artistry. Adapting Lovecraft’s loopy 1933 short story—a genius geometrist unearths the mathematical scribblings of a long-dead witch and literally follows her logic into the fourth dimension—could certainly prove a tricky task. But Sherman makes mistakes of the 30-blackouts-in-an-hour variety, turning out a product that looks more like a bulleted list of Lovecraft’s plot than an enlivening dramatization. Though Charlie Athanas’s multilayered scenery makes for an imposing presence, its multiple, symmetrical tiers move too much of the action upstage and away from the audience. And Paul Foster’s lights illuminate each shock of blood like the sun but allow the living characters to wander through shadow less evocative than obscuring.

Still, you can’t help admiring Dreams for what it does right. Toward play’s end, a tender meeting suddenly turns violent: In seconds, blood covers the stage, a character kicks the bucket, and audience members freak out. Aiming for a higher realm, Dreams only manages to grab its audience by the balls. But in a play that begins in small-town America and ends in a distant, witch-and-rat-infested galaxy, it’s no small feat to keep inducing squirms and squeals right until the gory end.