<html><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><p class=""><em class=""><strong class=""><font size="5" class="">From Yoly Heisler at <a href="http://Akronist.com" class="">Akronist.com</a> </font></strong></em></p><p class=""><em class=""><strong class="">“Wandering Aesthetics Theatre hosts ‘Boogers, Witches and Haints’ through Aug. 1</strong></em></p><p class="">Welcome to the Cuckoo’s Nest, a make-believe hostel where anything
can happen. “Boogers, Witches, and Haints: Spooky Stories from
Appalachia” is the end product of a long walk full of storytelling and
adventure-gathering along the Appalachian Trail by Director Benjamin
Rexroad and Actor Kyle Jozsa, from Wandering Aesthetics Theatre.</p><p class="">The play is currently showing inside the back room of the Standing Rock Cultural Arts Events gallery in Kent.</p><p class="">It is a room full of colorful yet disturbing artwork crowding inwards
onto a small stage barely big enough for one man to move around in,
flapping his arms, singing out loud, hearing voices from inside cups and
waving a blanket around as if it were another person.</p><p class="">Across the floodlights, nearly three dozen people sat staring at an
empty rocking chair, waiting. It was hot and stuffy, as if we were all
inside cabin with only one door and no windows. This is the place where
complicated stories can be laid bare.</p><p class="">Stories of boogeymen that come knocking and scratching at your
bedposts, witches of all colors and creeds, and haints of places you
would rather not venture into. Haints? What are haints? Well, they
aren’t witches, and they aren’t boogeymen. They are what they are, and
what they are is spooky.</p><p class="">It began as a light-hearted banter between Kyle and his audience, but
it quickly and stealthily became a conversation among a cast of 14 men
and women, three dogs, and a bee, and creatures only our minds could
see. Not all the characters spoke at once, but a good many of them
tried. Kyle’s one man show twisted and turned until every imagined cast
member threw its shadow over the audience.</p><p class="">This was no campfire retelling of tired and overexposed ghost
stories. Rather, it was as if we, the audience, were allowed to see
inside the stories themselves, to hear and feel as the characters
themselves heard and felt.</p><p class="">The fourth wall, that invisible barrier through which the audience
watches the show, was broken time and time again by innkeepers,
creatures, the narrator, and yes, even the studio lighting technician. <em class="">(Excellent play of lights there Kix (Kirsten Nicole), clever, but not so clever as to be found out.)</em></p><p class="">The people in attendance ate it up, taking their places as one of the
main characters in the story. A character that gasped and laughed, that
pushed the actor to tell them more, and in one “too true to life”
instance, to scream in a moment of sheer fright; the audience itself was
complicit.</p><p class="">“Boogers, Witches, and Haints” is delightful, frightful and
thoroughly enjoyable. There are three more performances of this
particular show scheduled for Saturday July 25, Friday July 31 and
Saturday Aug. 1. Each retelling will vary slightly, so don’t be afraid
to watch it more than once.</p><p class="">Better hurry though because if you miss these three performances you
will have to wait until Hallow’s Eve week in Akron to catch then again.</p><p class="">Standing Rock Cultural Arts Center is located at the North Water St Gallery, 300 N. Water St., Suite H, in Kent.</p><p class=""><span class="fsl">Tickets are $15 per person and are available online at <a href="http://www.BWHKent.brownpapertickets.com/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow nofollow" class="">www.BWHKent.brownpapertick<wbr class="">ets.com. </a>Reservations
may also be made by calling (330) 990-5138. Tickets will be available
at the door – but seating is limited so pre-orders are recommended."</span></p>
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