How many times have you heard someone say they went to see a western/zombie play? Most people would dismiss the idea of a western/zombie story especially one being played out on a stage. The two genres don’t seem to mesh well together when you put them in the same sentence. The western is a genre of post-Civil War America. The genre comes with a bravado similar to Arthurian mythology. The zombie genre has mostly been a contemporary tale. Usually a terrifying result of some wacky science experiment. Since The Walking Dead or Zombieland, the genre has seen a resurgence. We enjoy playing with the idea of “what if". The zombie and/ or zombie invasion has become a way to study relationships when love ones die and resurrect into a dangerous, poisonous being. Bill Daniel’s Hell Followed With Her attacks this study and blends it with drama you can only find in a well-written Western.
Willow Parker is a hardened bounty hunter out for revenge. For the two years, she’s travel far and wide to locate a man named Glanton, who muredered her family after escaping prison. She finds him in Dodge, Texas, along with a few other shady characters in a dimpy lit saloon. The zombie invasion starts of as subtle, with the town’s doctor mulling over the unusual bite marks he discovered from the last thirteen patients. As tensions skyrocket, the disease spread all over Dodge, and the sick have their sights set on the saloon where they can hear gunshots being fired.
Later, Willow Parker reveals that the disease has been following her throughout her journey for revenge. Every town she passed by is swallowed by the disease, which brings the two genres together in an interesting way. Though the origin of the disease is never revealed nor is there any explanation in the connection between the disease and Willow Parker’s revenge, the parallel adds an excitement foreign to the Western genre. An excitement that the genre could use (except for stuff like that 2011 film Cowboys and Aliens. That movie should cover the alien invasion angle). Without explanation, the audience can understand that the disease is a manifestation of Parker’s revenge. Where some revenge stories glorify the idea for an eye for an eye, Hell Followed With Her examines the revenge story as a dark passage that comes with heavy consequences when traveled.
Sophia Rosado gives a reserve performance as Willow Parker that works well with the cold-hearted character, but Krista D’Agostino, as Dr. Haxton is magnificent. Laying it all out on the stage, you feel her confusion, her sorrow, and panic. Out of all of the tough and rough characters in the play, hers is the most relatable. The intellectual trying to make sense of something supernatural.
The first half rolls along and ends on a high note that leaves the audience anxiously waiting for the outcome. But when the second half comes along it's stuffed with two flashbacks. One detailing a time when Willow Parker and another infamous bounty hunter Cole White met in Mexico. The other Glanton describes the night he murdered Parker’s parents. The play drags for the last fifteen minutes. A dice game is used as an attempt to intensify the moment but end up being unnecessary along with a shaky fight scene and long pauses in between lines. By the time the ending finally arrives, it ends the same it began with a song written by Bill Daniel called Willow’s Song. Sophia’s silky smooth voice almost makes up for the second half, but one may still leave their seat wishing there was smoother road to the end.
Despite the second-half’s length, Hell Followed With Her brings a different kind of story to the stage that blends well with the Halloween season. I challenge anyone that questions the idea of a western/zombie play being any good to see this show. It will shock you, make you laugh, and possibly change your mind on what’s possible and what’s not.
Through November 9th, 2019 at The Den Theater.
