Hollywood Fringe Review: Bloodsuckers (A Survival Guide)

Well, this sounds like fun: a TED talk from a vampire teaching new recruits what they need to know about their undead lifestyle if the expect to survive and thrive. The amusing conceit of Bloodsuckers (A Survival Guide) is that we are all – or almost all – vampires; there may be a few fence-post sitters and even some enemies, but our engaging though somewhat flustered host, Izzy (Sue Gisser), stumbles on as best she can, spelling out the basics, debunking the myths, and taking questions from the curious audience.

Along the way, her attempt to stick to useful facts and information is undercut – partly by safety concerns (there may be vampire hunters waiting outside) but mostly by personal history that keeps bubbling to the surface, taking her on tangents that, while interesting, are not necessarily the essential survival skills promised in the title.

The distractions are supposed to be part of the fun, and Izzy’s incompetence is played for comic effect, but after a while, the awkward pauses, the hemming and hawing, the dropped white board erasers and markers, and the repetitive vamping (pun intended – it’s used in the play) create a portrait a lecturer short on substance and desperate to fill the allotted time.

It hard helps that Izzy’s back story is not that interesting. She was attacked (essentially raped) by an aggressive male vampire back in the 1940s, but the ensuing decades have brought her little if any wisdom regarding her situation: she still seems hung up on the guy, who is lingering nearby, invisibly and inaudible, apparently asking questions to which she responds, creating yet another series of awkward pauses in the lecture.

Things pick up from time to time when Izzy focuses on her topic, especially when responding to feedback from the audience regarding vampire lore, but overall Bloodsuckers (A Survival Guide) feels like being trapped in a lecture given by a character unqualified to do the job.