It should come as no surprise that with Halloween right around the corner, Dracula is again haunting Cincinnati Shakespeare Company.
According to Cincy Shakes’ artistic director, Brian Isaac Phillips, it was an easy decision to repeat “Dracula: A Comedy of Terrors,” a hit from his theater’s 2025 season.
“This was one of our most successful productions of all time, and we loved welcoming so many new faces to the theater during the Halloween season,” Phillips said.
Phillips and Assistant Director Robert Carlton Stimmel have brought back the same five-person cast from a year ago for a second run of this comedic take on Bram Stoker’s bloodthirsty villain from 1896.
The script by Gordon Greenberg and Steve Rosen was a 2023 Off-Broadway hit. It quickly became popular at regional theaters across the U.S., and in 2025 a London production cemented its international reputation.
Greenberg and Rosen’s show is a version of the Gothic classic that goes without hesitation for the comedic jugular. The set, designed by Chris Hollaway, has off-kilter double doors and hanging paintings that are way off-center. Two large windows provide portals for startling entrances and exits, highlighted by rapid changes of colored lighting framing the stage, designed by Ben Niemczyk. In one scene, a comic bat flies in — like a fish on a line — and eventually meets its demise by a broom. All the production’s humor is underscored by Doug Borntrager’s playful sound effects. Rainy Edwards’s costume designs — especially for Dracula — are over-the-top, and Kayla Cieslinski’s zany wigs add humor to comic portraits.
All the story’s familiar characters appear, but with cartoonish zest. Dracula, played by Christopher Guthrie, clad in studded black leather and a swirling cape, is a self-centered vampire, full of preening exasperation and lewd innuendoes. With a silly accent — and some very funny mispronunciations — his comic missteps keep audiences giggling from start to finish.
The show’s other versatile actors amusingly play multiple roles, often changing characters with breathtaking swiftness. Most noteworthy is Billy Chace, who doubles as the sane, staid Dr. Westfeldt and the unhinged, bug-eating madman Renfield. (In one hysterical manic episode, he shifts back and forth in plain view of the audience.)
Veteran Kelly Mengelkoch similarly fills a pair of parts, as lovelorn Mina Westfeldt, with an unruly mop of red hair, who becomes Dracula’s first victim. She subsequently becomes fearless Dr. Van Helsing, an expert vampire hunter. Jasimine Bouldin is the lovely Lucy Westfeldt who captures Dracula’s fancy and occasionally becomes an unflinching, pragmatic housemaid who repeatedly throws cold water on the chaos. Bouldin also enlivens a pair of life-sized puppets designed by Matthew Lewis Johnson. Candice Handy is Lucy’s feckless fiancé, Jonathan Harker, whom Dracula inspires to become a lascivious lover.
The script follows the familiar legendary Transylvanian tale, but it constantly veers off on silly tangents, reminiscent of other Cincy Shakes’ comedic hits, including its long-running holiday favorite “Every Christmas Story Ever Told (and Then Some).” The performance concludes with some delightfully macabre choreography by Susan Jung, with the cast wearing glow-in-the-dark vampire teeth.
The production fuels the audience with purchasable cocktails and drinks in transfusion bags. It’s an evening of surefire laughter built on a scary foundation. “Dracula: A Comedy of Terrors” continues onstage through Saturday, Oct. 31.
On Friday, Oct. 30, it’s a special “Double, Double, Toil & Trouble Night.” Theatergoers are encouraged to come dressed as witches, wizards and vampires for a chance to win a themed prize.
For ticket information, head to cincyshakes.com.
