Review Fix Exclusive: Inside I Haunt You

Review Fix chats with Emily and Raymond Ulibarri about the new season of their production, I Haunt You.”

About the Production:

Arkansas’ critically acclaimed gothic romance has its sights set on NY

Melonlight Productions, the arts organization of the Melonlight Ballroom in downtown Eureka Springs, Arkansas, has been presenting theatre and dance-oriented pieces at its spacious theatre-in-the-round for years. Their flagship production, I Haunt You, has been a crowd pleaser for two full seasons, but lately that crowd is growing – and from other areas.

“I’m thrilled – even a bit shocked,” says Emily Ulibarri, Co-Founder of MELONLIGHT BALLROOM and one of the two stars of I Haunt You, “praise is rolling in – from other states and even counties,” she exclaimed. “we’ve been presenting quality works for over a decade,” Raymond Ulibarri, her partner in life and art chimed in, “but there’s something special about I Haunt You.”

I Haunt You is a gothic love story that spans a century. It is the story of three couples (all played by the Ulibarris) embroiled in erotic – and frightening – situations. One might surmise these are intertwined as two lovers reincarnated over and over until their business is finished; maybe these are parables of how much things change and yet stay the same, but in all suppositions, this comical, frightening, and romantic series of one-acts immerse their audience in gorgeous costuming, skillful acting, and mesmerizing movement.

With another season of performances at the ready, the Ulibarris have their sights set on bringing this production to New York.

“We are actively in development to transport the production off-Broadway – as early as late 2023,” Emily purports; “this is more feasible than we thought as we crunched the numbers and realized how inexpensive it will be for us to do so,” Raymond continued. The show was initially designed for an intimate setting with intentionally limited seating and accessible production values making it an easy production in their home theatre and – now they discover – an easy move to more visible venues.

The third season of I Haunt You will be playing at the Melonlight Ballroom, 2 Pine St, Eureka Springs, AR. All shows begin at 7pm, doors open at 6:30pm, September 2 – October 28.

More info and tickets at: https://www.melonlight.com/i-haunt-you

Review Fix: What was your inspiration behind this project? 

Emily Ulibarri: I Haunt You was always meant to be a duet for my husband and I, in fact that was its original working title – Duet. It was a professional goal, a passionate one, for my husband and I to write and produce a piece for just the two of us, to challenge ourselves and prove to ourselves that we could hold the stage with incredible energy and captivation, just us – and thus, the creation and production process itself was a love story, our love story. The project finally found its name, I Haunt You, and it evolved into a full length, spooky, romantic, and suspenseful stage show. The love stories of I Haunt You are much darker and much more tragic than our own love story (thank goodness!) I like to write tragedy and suspense, but I wouldn’t want to live out one of our stories. But we love a good ghost story; we love the suspense, nuance, and freedom that can come with creating within the supernatural genre. 

Review Fix: What’s your creative process like? 

Emily Ulibarri: Oh so fun! My favorite space to be in mind, especially in the beginning stages when characters and concepts are just coming into sight and sound. My husband and I will often set a very broad theme or concept, like for our show Silence in the Jungle, it was “pregnant in the jungle” – now write! I typically start “hearing voices”, like hearing the voice of the characters, literally the words of their dialogue right away. In fact, I find that if I can’t hear a character’s voice, like what they sound like and how they speak, I can’t write that character. It’s a very auditory process for me. That is usually happening simultaneously with creation of the overall story arc and outline. As soon as there is enough script written, my husband starts cutting the soundscape (all the music and background sound effects that are played through the entire show). He’s also the primary director. I think of him as the visionary. I hear all the things, and he sees them. He brings the script to beautiful, tangible reality on the stage. And then the things just start compounding from there, the process speeds up immensely with rehearsals, marketing, lighting and tech all coming together simultaneously. It’s such a whirlwind. I love it! But I also love the slower more introspective space when the story is just coming into being from thought to thing. Writing and conceptualizing the script is like waiting in line for the rollercoaster. Once the script is done, we’re on the coaster, there’s no stopping! 

Review Fix: What did you learn/are learning about yourself through this process/production? 

Raymond Ulibarri: We’re always learning through the process, and really in two distinct areas (at least two). The first being the professional skill set, learning to write, produce, act, execute all the things with more vision, clarity and efficiency. But the second layer of learning is much more connected to the soul, to the higher self, it’s the lessons the characters are learning. Our productions are extremely intimate, meaning I’m writing, exploring, and examining the philosophies that my soul is in need of learning. The creative process is a healing one. Oftentimes, I start writing a script and it’s not til I’m done or half done, that I’m like “oh shit, I see, that’s like a metaphor for what I’m going through in this other area of my life, got it, noted universe, thank you.” I’m definitely not writing autobiographies, but the spiritual lessons laced into my scripts are definitely the things my soul is pining after. Stories always teach us lessons, even the ones we write ourselves. It’s like the wiser me writing to the not so wise me. 

Review Fix: What are your ultimate goals for this for the future? 

Emily Ulibarri: Honestly, I want to do exactly what we’re doing for bigger audiences. My husband and I have created a strong voice as theater makers over the past twenty years; we’ve established our own venue so we can produce our own work and sell our own tickets. We connect intimately with our audiences, and they authentically love our work. I want to keep doing that…in new cities, cities like New York, Chicago, Vegas, dare I say London? Yes, I dare. Oh and we want to do that with themed cocktails for our guests; we don’t have cocktails at our venue, yet. 

Review Fix: What’s next? 

Raymond Ulibarri: We’re working on bringing I Haunt You to New York. We’re super ready for the expansion and the new experience. I think our show Silence in the Jungle could do really well in a new city also. And I can’t stop the writer in me. I’m working on a new script right now. It’s sexy and sensual in nature with some burlesque inspiration, it’s clever and funny, it will bring a little more dance back onto the stage for us (the dance floor being our original stomping ground). Oh and it’s the devil’s story. There’s always a dark side in our shows 

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 14245 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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