A night of theatre like no other. Three ghost hunters. One haunted hotel. One terrifying night of discoveries.

www.anightatthemangledmare.com

This is YOUR CALL to get involved in a glorious co-production between multi award winning Underdog Crew Studios and Starz Academy. We promise magic, chills, thrills and audience interaction like never before. We promise jump scares and cutting edge technology.

WE promise HUGE show stopping musical numbers.

Visit the website and listen for yourself.

But most importantly, we promise a year of some incredible marginalised young adults getting work on every single level of production - from scripting to the music score, props, wardrobe, music, acting, production managmeent and all.

**Up to 70 young adults - aged 12-18 - SEN specialist through Underdog Crew's Essex County Council funded "SENtrepreneur" programme.

LEARNING OVER 50 creative industry disciplines and skills

Professional certifiate of accomplishment post event.

A year long apprenticeship in the creative science of professional theatrical production, filmmaking and event management & promotion with the option for the cream of the crop to get internships at our regional theatres following the project.

PRE-PURCHASE your tickets as early VIP project sponsors.

Date and location TBC.

Colchester Mercury Theatre...

Ipswich Regent...

Clacton Prince's Theatre...

Our resources, professional and public support and creative persistance will guide our ambition for a 3-night run mid Summer 2027.

Now... onto the show...

A NIGHT AT THE MANGLED MAREA supernatural horror musical — live, loud and undead

Prepare to check into a night of theatre like no other.

A Night at the Mangled Mare is an original supernatural horror musical combining the spectacle of contemporary musical theatre with gothic mystery, dark comedy, paranormal investigation and a thunderous live score.

Expect seductive Victorian cabaret, explosive Broadway choruses, folk-punk drinking anthems, cinematic orchestration, glam-rock swagger and pounding drum-and-bass breakbeats—all unfolding within the decaying ballroom of a hotel that has been keeping its darkest guest hidden for more than a century.

The hook

The police never caught Jack the Ripper. The dead did.

Logline

Three struggling ghost hunters enter the abandoned Mangled Mare Hotel hoping to film the paranormal investigation that will save their failing television programme. But when gifted young investigator Dottie Nightingale connects with the spirit of murdered showgirl, Betsy Backler, the team uncovers evidence that the hotel’s flamboyant former proprietor was the man history remembers as Jack the Ripper.

The story

In 1888, notorious showman, illusionist and occultist Simpkin Bartholomew Weatherspoon stands trial inside the ballroom of his own hotel.

The charges include fraud, grave robbery, blasphemy and unlawful communication with the dead—but beneath every accusation lies a far more terrible crime that nobody dares speak aloud.

The locals know Simpkin’s secret.

They sentence him, hang him and seal his remains beneath the ballroom inside one of his own illusion cabinets.

Then the Mangled Mare closes its doors.

One hundred and twenty years later, paranormal television presenter Rex Graves enters the abandoned hotel with sceptical technician P.J Sparks and Dottie Nightingale—a passionate investigator whose extraordinary sensitivity to the spirit world has always been dismissed by the men around her.

Rex wants sensational footage. P.J expects faulty wiring, collapsing floors and another career-ending disaster.

Dottie hears the women beneath the hotel.

As midnight approaches, the ballroom awakens. Ghostly performers return to the stage, murdered women reclaim their voices and Simpkin emerges from the shadows determined to control his legend one final time.

To survive the night, Dottie must uncover the truth buried beneath the ballroom—and prove that the dead have been waiting for someone brave enough to listen.

A unique theatrical experience

This is not simply a musical. It is a full supernatural theatrical event filled with live investigation, projected camera footage, ghostly cabaret, audience interaction, striking practical effects and huge ensemble numbers.

The original songs include the ferocious courtroom opener “Send Him Down,” Dottie’s defiant anthem “Don’t Kill My Ambition,” and the murdered women’s riotous supernatural showstopper “By the Hand of Simpkin Weatherspoon.”

Funny, frightening, provocative and unexpectedly moving, A Night at the Mangled Mare asks who controls history, why society remembers the killer more readily than the victims - and what happens when the forgotten finally return to tell their own story.

Check in. Hear the dead. Discover the truth.

Description supplied by the event organiser.