The purpose is to show that sin is real and that you'll go to hell if you don't repent. They act out scenes of real life sins they think teenagers are at risk of, from drunk driving to AIDS, abortion to the occult, domestic violence to school shooting. After groups of visitors pass through these deliberately gritty and violent scenes, they pass through a heaven room (where some actors are angels and others are dragged away by devils), a hell room (where the actors they've seen i nthe earlier scenes are being tormented by demons in lurid red light), and finally - as the screams from the hell room ring from next door - a chance to go to a room where "people are willing to pray with you, in fact they've been praying for you since you've been here." You may not think you're a sinner, says the preacher, but sin is sin, whether it's murder or lying occasionally to your parents. If you were to die right now, are you sure you wouldn't go to hell?The whole thing is shocking and manipulative in the extreme, and the film elicited very strong reactions from our students. "This is not theater!" insisted some, while others - including one who had seen a hell house - argued that it was unquestionably theatrical, and that it's hypocritical to deplore in our own culture what we consider interesting and worth understanding in the religious rituals of other cultures (like a violent Balinese trance dance we watched on film earlier).
But what about "Everyman," I asked. If "Hell House" isn't theater, is "Everyman"? Doesn't it seek to achieve the same thing - no mere entertainment it's supposed to jolt the viewer awake to the precarious state of her soul.
