A Midsummer Nightmare

On Friday 22, garments will be rent and shorts will be stained when the Vortex Theater Company presents its grisly ode to horror, A Midsummer Nightmare, at the Sanford Meisner Theater (164 Eleventh Ave between 22nd and 23rd Sts, midsummernightmare.com). For $6 (plus dollar whiskey shots, for those lacking sufficient intestinal fortitude), anyone 18 or over will be subjected to a maze of phobias that they’re forced to experience alone. Nightmare cocreator Josh Randall gave us the no-spoiler lowdown on the ghoulish terrors that await. “We’re playing off three basic fears,” says Randall. “Pitch blackness, sex and bathroom issues.”

Darkness: Is there anything scarier than being alone in a dark wood with nothing but your own paranoid thoughts to keep you company? “People terrify themselves,” says Randall. “Put someone in a dark hallway, and chances are they’ll come up with plenty of things that scare them—on their own.”

Sex: We’ve been scared of sex ever since we realized that it was a sport that requires skills, but Randall has something even creepier in mind. “We cover sexual perversity and fetishes like sadomasochism. We created a voyeuristic setting where you’re asked to watch a particular act with a violent twist to it. Part of the idea is not only to see something disgusting and horrifying, but to elicit a response from an audience member. They can’t do anything about it, and there’s a kind of torture-porn aspect to that.”

Bathroom: Apparently, there are scarier things than an American Standard full of digested burritos and PBRs. Randall tells us that one of Nightmare’s rooms “involves a toilet and what goes in it…or the things that come out. It will be slightly fantastical, but not necessarily supernatural.” Sci-fi poo?

BOO! Nighmare is giving away four pairs of tickets to their spook-fest. E-mail ownthiscity@timeoutny.com with your biggest fear for a chance to win.

NEXT Pitch-black bathrooms aren’t your scene? Check out our top four other summer thrills.

More in Own This City