Doctor Cerberus
Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa has written a “sweet and canny portrait of the artist as a young fanboy,” said Charlotte Stoudt in the Los Angeles Times.
South Coast Repertory
Los Angeles
(714) 708-5555
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
***
Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa has written a “sweet and canny portrait of the artist as a young fanboy,” said Charlotte Stoudt in the Los Angeles Times. It’s the mid-1980s, and 13-year-old Franklin has become obsessed with Cerberus, the cheesy, plastic-fanged vampire host of a local late-night TV horror show called Nightmare Theatre. He’s also a Stephen King wannabe who spends nights in his bedroom writing short stories in which “mummies run amok and parents are carved up for dinner.” Franklin’s love of all things freaky turns out to be part adolescent self-discovery, part an attempt to escape from his family’s “blood-sucking ways.” His jock brother ridicules his geeky tendencies, and his warring parents undercut his writerly ambitions. Home, it seems, is where the real horror is.
Like its teen protagonist, Doctor Cerberus is “much more substantial than it first seems,” said Paul Hodgins in the Orange County, Calif., Register. What seems like a lighthearted salute to campy TV creature-features quickly gains surprising depth: Franklin also must deal with a dawning awareness that he’s gay, and his attempts to break this news to his rage-filled father and mean-spirited mother are scarier than anything on late-night television. Jamison Jones pulls impressive double duty as two of Franklin’s mentors—both the titular TV host and Franklin’s uncle, an ailing television writer who nurtures the boy’s own artistic dreams. Brett Ryback, meanwhile, vividly brings Franklin to life in a tour de force portrayal of “a young creative mind trying to find its outlet.”
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
-
5 contentious cartoons about Matt Gaetz's AG nomination
Cartoons Artists take on ethical uncertainty, offensive justice, and more
By The Week US Published
-
Funeral in Berlin: Scholz pulls the plug on his coalition
Talking Point In the midst of Germany's economic crisis, the 'traffic-light' coalition comes to a 'ignoble end'
By The Week UK Published
-
Joe Biden's legacy: economically strong, politically disastrous
In Depth The President boosted industry and employment, but 'Bidenomics' proved ineffective to winning the elections
By The Week UK Published
-
If/Then
feature Tony-winning Idina Menzel “looks and sounds sensational” in a role tailored to her talents.
By The Week Staff Last updated
-
Rocky
feature It’s a wonder that this Rocky ever reaches the top of the steps.
By The Week Staff Last updated
-
Love and Information
feature Leave it to Caryl Churchill to create a play that “so ingeniously mirrors our age of the splintered attention span.”
By The Week Staff Last updated
-
The Bridges of Madison County
feature Jason Robert Brown’s “richly melodic” score is “one of Broadway’s best in the last decade.”
By The Week Staff Last updated
-
Outside Mullingar
feature John Patrick Shanley’s “charmer of a play” isn’t for cynics.
By The Week Staff Last updated
-
The Night Alive
feature Conor McPherson “has a singular gift for making the ordinary glow with an extra dimension.”
By The Week Staff Last updated
-
No Man’s Land
feature The futility of all conversation has been, paradoxically, the subject of “some of the best dialogue ever written.”
By The Week Staff Last updated
-
The Commons of Pensacola
feature Stage and screen actress Amanda Peet's playwriting debut is a “witty and affecting” domestic drama.
By The Week Staff Last updated