Tarantula! - Chandler Studio, RSAMD - December 2006In the town of Taranto victims of the tarantula danced a frenzied tarantella to prevent death from tarantism. There were strong suggestions that there was no organic cause for the heightened excitability and restlessness that gripped the dancers. However, these Tarantata said their wild, ecstatic rites would purge them of the tarantula poison coursing through their veins. And secretly, they whispered that they danced because they loved to and because they were told not to by the powers that wished an end to frenzy.
Image copyright to Helen Cuinn
- A medium scale studio theatre piece devised in collaboration between 8 performance students and Robert Walton and Eilidh MacAskill of Fish and Game . Devised from disparate areas of the camp acting style of 50's 'B' movies and the horror genre, ancient Italian folklore of dancing out the poison of spider bites, and human fears of monsters, real or imaginary, Tarantula! employed song, dance and frenzy to parody current fears in our climate of terror and media spin.