Grand Guignol

Showman and master of the macabre, Mondreau the Magnificent has been stunning carnival crowds for more than 15 years with his gory exhibitions. Mondreau, whose real name is Vincent Van Dorpe, puts on a grand guignol show called “The Theatre of Pain”. The blood flows in gouts and the actors scream as their bodies are gouged, burned and maimed by many different cruel devices and methods. “All in good fun” as Mondreau likes to put it. Mondreau assures the stunned crowd it was just a show and always brings the actors out to take a bow. The show is so realistic that most find it hard to put out of their minds.

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Over the last few years many people have asked him how he does it. He politely refuses of course. The investigators have been hired to look into the show and what the mysterious Van Dorpe’s ulterior motives are, if any.

Possibilities

1 Van Dorpe is really an ancient and powerful sorcerer and devoted servant of Shub Niggurath. Some of his actors are re-animated dead bodies, which he uses in his show. In addition to his zombies he has a loyal band of gypsy disciples, which he has promised immortality if they follow him and do his bidding. The undead used in the act really are hacked and maimed, but since they are undying, they simply need to be stitched back together. Using several different stage names and acts he has been touring the world with his band of animated dead for the past 122 years. His followers are totally loyal to him and will defend Van Dorpe and the show to the death. Van Dorpe needs to travel as he does to sustain himself and his followers. Large quantities of blood and human sacrifices for his god are all that keep him from the death that he has for so long eluded.

2 Mondreau the Magnificent is the leader of a troupe of cannibals. The Theatre of Pain is a front for their activities. Between cities Van Dorpe and his cannibalistic entourage pick up hitchhikers and transients. The unlucky victims are fed, drugged and hypnotized for use in the show. The people who are maimed and tortured on stage really are. There are no mythos influences involved, just garden variety cannibalism.

3 Mondreau the Magnificent is what he says he is… a showman. He and his troupe have honed their act to the point of perfection. The reason his act is so realistic is that the actors who play the victims really are maimed, but not by him. Van Dorpe uses actors who are amputees or suffer from some form of handicap to add to the realism. When an arm is sawn off in the show it is a realistic prosthetic or when an eye is gouged out it was glass. His troupe of actors is devoutly loyal to him and will not divulge any of Mondreau’s secrets of stagecraft.

© Kevin Kaier