A technical issue almost caused the Stranger Things play to be scrapped. The popular Netflix original series saw its story continue in the form of a prequel play titled Stranger Things: The First Shadow. Part of the appeal of the Stranger Things prequel was getting to learn more about the origin story of Henry Creel, aka Vecna. The play reveals how Henry’s mother, Virginia Creel, was killed by a mind flayer back in 1959. In Stranger Things Season 4, a scene shows Virginia being killed when she’s levitated up in the air. Fans also witnessed her limbs snapping. Unfortunately, recreating that moment seemed to be a problem for Stranger Things: The First Shadow.
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The Netflix documentary Behind the Curtain: Stranger Things: The First Shadow takes fans behind the scenes of the making of the play, and how the prop failing almost brought everything to a screeching halt. As the team prepared for its West End opening night, they continuously had issues with the Virginia Creel death scene. Every time they did a walkthrough and testing, the robotic Virginia’s limbs snapped while seated instead of when she was hovering in the air. At one point in the documentary, you can see theater producer Sonia Friedman getting visibly upset.
“It was fine,” assistant manager Abbie Procter said during an on-camera interview as The First Shadow neared the end of its preview run. “It was an interesting one. The main issue is our breakable Virginia dummy who likes to break too early for reasons that we don’t know why.”
She added, “The dummy needs to do what Virginia does in the TV show, and that’s fly up in the air and all her bones break. But currently, she likes to break in her chair.”
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Friedman came to the conclusion that the show must go on, with or without a functioning Virginia Creel. “We just have to keep going with what we’ve got,” she said. “We can’t cancel the show. We just can’t.”
What made the prop’s malfunction a bigger deal is that the cast and crew of Stranger Things flew in to see the play in person. Matt and Ross Duffer, creators of Stranger Things, and stars Matthew Modine and David Harbour were in attendance. The Stranger Things: The First Shadow kept testing the dummy hours before the opening, and luckily, the prop. had no issues.
“We’re still buzzing,” Ross Duffer said after seeing the Stranger Things play. “It was crazy… Virginia Creel breaking, that hasn’t been working. So the fact it worked perfectly, and the audience’s response to it… that was probably the happiest I was that whole play. Just to see her arms break flawlessly.”
“Ross and I love to see limbs break.” Matt Duffer joked.
“The challenge is to create a visceral experience for the audience, where they feel shock and awe, surprise and delight,” says Stephen Daldry, the Tony–winning director of the stage play. “You have to deliver that. The fusion of television and theater is about the speed of [the] narrative and how you create it … There are moments in the show where you will think, ‘I don’t understand how they did that.’ ”
Stranger Things: The First Shadow comes to Broadway later this year. Let us know if you’ll be giving it a watch in the comments below!
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