COMING TO THE 2011 KANSAS CITY FRINGE FESTIVAL

BY BRYAN COLLEY AND TARA VARNEY

In 1941, five people gathered in a remote Maryland cabin to put
a curse on Adolf Hitler and end World War II using witchcraft.

This is the true story of what happened that night.

STARRING

Kipp Simmons as William Seabrook
Sarah Mae Lamar as Constance Kuhr
Doogin Brown as Richard Tupper
Melody Butler as Ruth Birdseye
Parry Luellen as Tom McAvoy

Directed by Tara Varney

OFF CENTER THEATRE in CROWN CENTER

Tickets $10 with a $5 Fringe Button (available at the box office)

WHO IS WILLIAM SEABROOK?

William Seabrook popularized the word "zombie" in 1927 when he published a book about his adventures in Haiti, "Mysterious Island," which served as the basis for the film "White Zombie" in 1931. That might be his biggest claim to fame today, but throughout the 1930s he was a best-selling author, world traveler, and journalist. He was also fascinated with witchcraft, black magic, and the occult. Along with writing about voodoo rituals on the island of Haiti, he wrote about eating human flesh in the jungles of Africa, battling alcoholism in an asylum, and joining a Bedouin tribe much like T.E. Lawrence in "Lawrence of Arabia." Not bad for a missionary's son who grew up in Kansas. "Putting a Hex on Hitler" was a photo essay by Tom McAvoy published in Life Magazine in 1941. In the next three years before his suicide in 1944, he would marry his sadistic third wife, have his first child, and publish his autobiography, "No Hiding Place."