A set of cushy headphones is perched on every seat at the Minetta Lane Theatre, where A Ghost in Your Ear premiered on Wednesday. A London success earlier this year, the aptly named supernatural thriller employs binaural sound technology to provide an intimate three-dimensional listening experience through those headphones. Artfully composed and staged by writer-director Jamie Armitage evidently in close collaboration with the sound designers Ben & Max Ringham, the drama neatly delivers two scary stories, although the second begins to materialize only later in the 90-minute proceedings.
The modern-day location is a recording studio; gray soundproof walls are pierced at the rear only by a blank door and more prominently a glass window revealing the control booth. Above the window, a razor-thin electronic sign at times flashes the word “recording” against an orange field. Positioned in the middle of the studio is a tall, head-shaped microphone. The setting is designed inside a claustrophobic letterbox frame by Anisha Fields, who also selected the casual duds. Everything appears ultra-realistic.
Don those headphones. A chilly voiceover checks the aural balance. The show begins.
[Read Frank Scheck’s ★★★☆☆ review here.]
A nice-looking professional actor in his 30s, Lucas (Lucas Iverson) arrives for a last-minute audiobook-type job arranged through the help of Sid (Owen Campbell), an old chum who’s the sound engineer. Lucas is there to make a solo recording of a classic ghost story while Sid supplies the necessary sound effects. The words of this tale, unfamiliar to Lucas, are said to appear on a screen across the invisible fourth wall, so the actor naturally will face the audience more than Sid, usually situated in the control booth behind.
Known as a one-take wonder, Lucas soon smoothly launches into performing a brooding yarn about an inheritance and somebody’s nighttime visit to an old dark house. Heard only through the headset, the breath-on-your neck seduction of the actor’s warm voice, the strangely familiar story he tells, and the many sound effects merge to sink deeply into one’s psyche. The lighting is low; the ruddy recording sign glows. Little disturbing things start to happen inside the studio and … let’s reveal no more.
One extremely slick attraction, A Ghost in Your Ear is a yummy piece of Halloween candy aimed for date nights and families with teens, because it’s ultimately an entertaining horror show where not a dirty word is ever heard. Armitage’s well-calculated staging enhances his spooky thriller with designer Ben Jacobs’ subtly shaded and sharply cued atmospheric lighting. Personable actors, Iverson and Campbell deliver believable performances as everyday dudes whose easy semblance of reality contrasts with the increasingly weird doings materializing within a sealed-off room where no one can hear them scream. The Minetta Lane Theatre seats fewer than 400 people, so between their relatively near proximity to the stage and the intimacy of their aural experience, viewers may expect a few scares to be too close for comfort. But that’s why they go, right?
A Ghost in Your Ear opened Wednesday, October 14, 2026 at the Minetta Lane Theatre and runs through November 22. Tickets and information: audibletheater.com
