An unsettlingly intimate portrayal of a brilliant artist at her most troubled, Shudder’s A Nightmare Wakes, written and directed by Nora Unkel, traces the tortured birth of a timeless masterwork and the rightful ascension of its creator to stand alongside her creation. The film debuts on February 4th – days after the 170th anniversary of Mary Shelley’s death on February 1st, 1851.
While composing her famous novel Frankenstein, Mary Shelley (Alix Wilton Regan, The Wife) descends into an opium-fueled fever dream while carrying on a torrid love affair with Percy Shelley (Giullian Yao Gioiello, Scream: The TV Series, Marvel’s Iron Fist). As she writes, the characters of her novel come to life and begin to plague the relationships with those closest to her as the shadow of her monster threatens to overcome her.
Shot with a majority female production crew, the sweeping psychological thriller is steeped in accurate period details but told with a modern perspective. While the filmmakers took great pains to be as historically accurate as possible in the movie’s lighting and design, they chose to cast racially diverse actors.
A Nightmare Wakes will debut exclusively on Shudder in the US, Canada, UK, Ireland, Australia, and New Zealand, as well as via the Shudder offering within the AMC+ bundle where available.
Produced by Robert Menzies, Devin Shepherd, Gabriel Rosenstein, Frédéric Fiore, and Eric Tavitian. John Connor, DJ Dodd, Dave Conlon, Bruce Fleming, Paul Moyer and Dan Wong executive produced. A Logical Pictures and Wild Obscura production, in association with Zed.film, The Spitting Image, and Eggplant Picture and Sound.
A Nightmare Wakes was a selection of the 2017 IFP Week and 2019 IFP Narrative Lab, as well as the 2017 Frontières Co-Production Market at Fantasia and 2019 Frontières Platform at Cannes. The film premiered at Salem Horror Fest’s virtual edition this past October.
