‘A Ghost In Your Ear’ Off-Broadway review — headphones bring the haunting into the audience

Read our review of A Ghost In Your Ear off Broadway, a new horror play written and directed by Jamie Armitage and featuring binaural sound technology.

Summary

• A Ghost In Your Ear follows an actor who gets haunted in real life while recording a horror audiobook
• The show uses binaural sound technology and headphones so every sound feels up close and personal
• The show has a predictable plot but is strengthened by its sound design and Lucas Iverson's performance
• The show is recommended for jumpscare horror fans and fans of Iverson in The Pitt

Horror has been all the rage on stage lately, from The Lost Boys to Stranger Things: The First Shadow to Paranormal Activity on Broadway. And now that it’s spooky season, there couldn’t be a better time to get an extra dose of jumpscare. Enter A Ghost In Your Ear, now playing off Broadway at Audible’s Minetta Lane Theatre after a successful run in London earlier this year.

A Ghost In Your Ear is set apart from other horror shows by the concept: the binaural sound design that guides the entire experience. In a collaboration between Tony Award-nominated writer/director Jamie Armitage (Six) and sound designers Ben and Max Ringham (Inter Alia, Prima Facie), each audience member experiences the play through a set of headphones, provided at each seat. And for a project that revolves around sound, it’s only fitting that the story is set in a recording studio.

Sid (Owen Campbell) is a sound engineer, recruiting an actor friend for a last-minute recording of a horror story. The actor, Lucas (Lucas Iverson), is game for anything. But as the recording intensifies, Lucas begins to feel the studio is being haunted by the very story he’s narrating, of an estranged son traveling to assess his recently deceased father’s remote manor.

Of course, one of the most prominent features of the story — and the set — of A Ghost In Your Ear is the dummy head binaural microphone that allows Lucas's voice to get up close and personal with the audience. His delivery is seductive, and he modulates his voice to mimic a fireplace crackling or a quilt sliding over his head without stopping the narration — an effect that is either extremely pleasing or pretty off-putting, depending how you feel about ASMR.

As the recording goes on, Iverson whirls the humanoid microphone around the room with him like a dancer executing a complicated routine. He takes advantage of the binaural sound to play with space and depth, making the manor feel like a physical place the listener is inhabiting. His ability to melt into the narrative is a joy to watch, and especially impressive given that he replaced Harry Richardson shortly before performances began.

However, neither the story nor the story-within-a-story quite live up to the premise. Not enough time is spent on Sid and Lucas’s narrative to make it feel like more than a framing device, and the scary story being recorded in the sound studio is predictable and awkwardly paced. And both narratives take too long to introduce the inevitable paranormal interference. Perhaps A Ghost In Your Ear suffers in comparison to another horror play it seems to have been inspired by: 1987's The Woman In Black, which also had its NYC debut at Minetta Lane Theatre in 2001.

Regardless, the headphone experience is a unique one, with an intimate format that gives you goosebumps. Watching an actor move from one side of the binaural microphone to the other and hearing the whisper in your corresponding ears is not only an extremely satisfying cause-and-effect, but also a way to make each viewer feel like the story is being told only to them.

A Ghost In Your Ear summary

Sound engineer and expectant father Sid calls in actor friend Lucas to help him finish a last-minute project for an unnamed client who wants to experiment with binaural sound and classic ghost stories. The job is to record a horror story, the deadline is that night, and Lucas showed up late, so there’s no time to lose. But as Lucas gets deeper into narrating the scripted tale, the spooky things on the page begin to haunt the recording studio until Lucas can’t be sure what’s in the story and what’s happening in real life.

What to expect at A Ghost In Your Ear

Anisha Fields’s set appears to be a pretty straightforward recording booth at the outset — a place so utilitarian and well-lit that scaredy-cats might feel safe from any kind of hauntings. But the presence of that binaural microphone, shaped like a human head with ears and the suggestion of eyes and a nose, is ripe with suspense. Is it inevitable that the ghost in the story that Lucas is telling would haunt the microphone head itself? In theory, yes, of course. But the reality of it happening is the least effective horror of the show. Perhaps it’s too on the nose — or maybe it’s just not very scary.

A Ghost In Your Ear runs 90 minutes with no intermission.

What audiences are saying about A Ghost In Your Ear

Audiences have shared mixed to positive responses to A Ghost In Your Ear, with some finding the story exciting and others finding it predictable, but largely praised the unique audio design and the performances. On the review aggregator Show-Score, the show has a 74% audience approval rating as of writing.

• “Very cool idea with the audio design and the story within a story is compelling.” - Show-Score user Susana M
• “A bit cheesy, slow, and not that exciting. I never felt on the edge of my seat despite the good acting.” - Show-Score user Kim G City
• “So uniquely chilling. Absolutely loved it.” - Show-Score user Rachel R
• “Some truly terrifying moments, and terrific tech all the way, although I felt the story unraveled a bit at the end, and the final moment was so arch it soured the whole show for me.” - Show-Score user Peter B

Read more audience reviews of A Ghost In Your Ear on Show-Score.

Who should see A Ghost In Your Ear

• People who love a good jumpscare will find some great ones here — even if you know they’re coming. The sound and Ben Jacobs's lighting design can make even the most blasé theatregoers jump out of their seats.
• Fans of The Pitt will be excited to see Lucas Iverson in the intimate role of the hapless actor who brings the horror story to life.
• People who want to try out a binaural audio experience in a theatre will get a great introduction to the technology at A Ghost In Your Ear, thanks to the sound design of Ben and Max Ringham.

Learn more about A Ghost In Your Ear off Broadway

A Ghost In Your Ear combines effective sound design with classic horror tropes — a haunted manor, a debilitating storm, a dark past — to create a truly unique experience on stage. But the plot fails to frighten when the classic fades into the predictable.

Learn more and get A Ghost In Your Ear tickets on New York Theatre Guide. A Ghost In Your Ear runs at Audible’s Minetta Lane Theatre through December 12.

Photo credit: A Ghost in Your Ear off Broadway. (Photos by Matthew Murphy)