The late Edward Gorey had a macabre imagination. His illustrations of neo-Victorian characters — the sort you'd expect to see on a storyboard for a Tim Burton movie — are black and white and spooky but somehow captivating, and the accompanying tales are whimsical in a gruesome, disturbing sort of way. In The Gashlycrumb Tinies, a series of rhyming couplets describe the bizarre fates of a few dozen children, from Ernest, who choked on a peach, to Fanny, sucked dry by a leech, while The Hapless Child focuses on the mounting misfortunes of an utterly luckless little girl. Jobsite Theater opens its 2007-08 season with Gorey Stories, a darkly comic play based on 18 of Gorey's stories, poems and limericks, including Tinies and Child. Jobsite's Halloween-time production features gothic costumes by Best of the Bay Award-winning designer Katrina Stevenson and music performed live by an onstage trio; David Jenkins directs. Through Nov. 4, 8 p.m. Thurs.-Sat., 4 p.m. Sun., Shimberg Playhouse-Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center, 1010 N. MacInnes Place, downtown Tampa, $24.50 general ($10 rush tickets available 30 minutes prior to curtain for students, seniors and military with valid I.D.), 813-229-7827, tbpac.org.
This article appears in Oct 17-23, 2007.