Getting Hay Wired by Halloween favorites, Hell in a Handbag! By Brian Kirst

With so many offshoots within the horror genre, it may be hard for a devoted fan to pick a favorite. To name a few: there’s the slasher movie, the ghost story, the currently popular torture porn and for those whose rubbery limbs reach far back enough – there’s the ingenious and bloodily campy Hag Horror. Dawning with the age of Whatever Happened to Baby Jane in the mid-60’s, Hag Horror gave popular, unemployed middle aged actresses a new lease on life amid swinging axes and frequent beheadings. The pretty ladies who reaped its benefits included everyone from Shelley Winters and Debbie Reynolds to Veronica Lake and Tallulah Bankhead. The most active of its participants, of course, were Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, Baby Jane’s stars and the kickoff points for this particular terror revolution. In fact, Crawford made her mark playing several powerful, seemingly crazed heroines in such fright fests as Haywire, Strait Jacket and her final picture, Trog.

In Chicago, the legendary Hell in a Handbag Productions (www.handbagproductions.com) plays tribute to the horror filled antics of Crawford with their ingenious Haywire through November at the Bailiwick Arts Center, 1229 W. Belmont, 1-800-838-3006.

This stage amalgamation of the original Haywire and Strait Jacket (produced by the legendary William Castle – with Crawford being a prime focus of the excellent Castle documentary that is currently playing at various creep filled festivals) concentrates on the murderous Miranda Towers, the heir to the Towers Circus. After mysteriously being released from an asylum, many years after she murdered her husband and his lover, Towers returns to her now faded legacy, determined to return it to its former glory. Of course, violent murders by a hooded psychotic and the nefarious schemes of a duo of twisted lovers cause Miranda much heartache and might drive her to kill again – if she hasn’t begun already, that is.

As Towers, with the help of agile director Cheryl Snodgrass, David Cerda nails the over-the-top dramatic force that Joan Crawford exhibited in those grue filled latter day classics and unlike fellow modern day champion Michael Phelps – he never exhibits the need to have to come up for breath. Additionally, Ed Jones marvels as the duplicitous Reynaldo – easily stealing the audience’s hearts with his amazingly natural talent – and Megan Keach plays two very different roles with such comic technique that she is worthy of any awards that should (rightfully) come her way. As Towers’ trapeze artist boyfriend, Aaron Michael Adamkiewicz compels with the charm and masculinity of such 1960’s He Men as The Birds’ Rod Taylor and Sam Brown shows enthusiasm, stage presence and dexterity as one of the circus clowns.

Thankfully, for all those chunk loving gore hounds, Haywire also doesn’t stray to far away from it macabre source material. There is plenty of blood, deadly action and a slaughter by a candy apple machine that is so brilliant it simply has to be seen to be believed.