Uncanny – Alhambra Theatre, Bradford

Writer: Danny Robins

Director: Sam Hodges

Off the back of phenomenally popular podcast, TV show and book, Danny Robins is back with his live show Uncanny.

Robins greets the audience like they are old friends, and there is clearly a strong and supportive community here, a mix of some ‘sceptics’ and a whole lot of ‘believers’. The audience clearly can’t wait to delve into his new stories and explore their paranormal potential, and Robins never fails to deliver, taking on the role of narrator and joined by his expert team, ‘skeptic’ Chris French and ‘believer’ Evelyn Hollow.

It is Robins as storyteller that keeps the audience hooked, with his atmospheric tales mixed with the experts’ practical insights. The main story is of Matthew and Lisa, who live above the plumbing shop Matthew works in. Through interviews, lighting and staging effects, we piece by piece unpick their disturbing paranormal experience. The audience weighs in as the tale unfurls, adding their theories and questions while trying to solve the mystery, though the regular use of jump scares, screams and lighting bursts in this main narrative smack of thinly veiled ghoulishness rather than a real life experience.

We later hear a second story about a family spooked by the untimely death of their neighbours. While this is on some levels a more believable story than the first, again the leaning on theatrical elements detracts from what could be a carefully curated emotionally rich story, if the show aimed for the authentic search for truth over theatrics. At times the performative elements seem to trivialise the content and take away from Robins’ natural ability to keep the audience in the palm of his hand with his storytelling.

The set generally works well, the creepy lighting intertwined in bare tree branches against a spooky forest, sets up all the usual tropes of the scary tales to come. The use of a simple door is a cleaver and flexible mechanic to take the audience into different times and places.

Later in the show, there is an is an interesting segment where audience members tell their own ghost stories, and it’s in the space that the work feels its most authentic and where there is a real opportunity to extend. Your reviewer would take Robins sitting on the edge of an empty stage talking to the audience about their experiences, over the theme park effects any day, if you really want to turn this sceptic into a believer.

Reviewed on 8th June 2024. Touring until 22nd July.