The Gothic tale of magic, madness, murder and mystery is a stylish production inspired by true events on the Isle of Iona. Netta used to roam the beaches and moorland of the island each day, and attempt to contact the ‘spirits’ of the island each night through trances. It wasn’t until the early hours of the 19th November that Netta’s body was discovered by two locals, Hector MacLean and Hector MacNiven next to Sithean Mor, the faery hill of Iona. I think she did establish contact with another world”, he said, during his own investigation into the case.

McRae inquired about her distress, Netta claimed she was under “telepathic attack” by several individuals. When he learned later of Netta’s death, he could only explain his feelings as a premonition or telepathy. In his memoirs, Aleister Crowley also claimed to have been a victim of a psychic attack, and also said he had done battle with someone on the astral plane.

MacRae, and since she had packed a large amount of her belongings, it was clear that she had intended to stay on the island for quite some time. Her photo has also been used as belonging to Moina Mathers, the wife of Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers).

As Mathers had been dead for eighteen months she could only have inflicted the scratches from beyond the grave. Neither of which could account for mysterious deep scratches on Netta’s body and on the bottoms of her feet. Her behaviour on her last day suggests she was afraid to stay on the island, but at the same time resigned to it. Perhaps she believed that life force was strongest on Iona or perhaps she thought that something evil lurked on the island that only she could destroy, we will never know. In fact, after a short spell in her room, she emerged and told Mrs MacRae that she had changed her mind, and that she would be staying indefinitely on the island.The revelation of that secret is done with technical wizardry, a marriage of film and theatre, which is a feature of the performance in this joint production between Moray-based Wildbird and Mull Theatre. Shetland Arts presents The Mysterious Death of Netta Fornario by Mull Theatre and Wildbird in Walls and Lerwick in June.

Marie Norah Emily Edith Fornario, known as “Netta”, was born in Cairo, Egypt in 1897, the daughter of Norah Edith Ling and Guiseppe Nicola Raimundo Fornario, an English mother and Italian doctor father. There is an interesting book, "The Immortal Hour: The True Story of Netta Fornario," by Ben Oakley that includes many details of her life. It was later found that Netta had packed a ton (not literally) of luggage, so was seemingly planning to stay for quite a while. It’s never been entirely clear what Netta meant by that, but her housekeeper must have been used to her coming out with such things.

Her mother died when she was just a year old, at which time her father sent her to live with her maternal grandfather, a prosperous tea importer.

Her body was found on a Fairy Mound on the South of Loch Staonaig, Iona (see map below) in mid November 1929. Netta spent most of her days wandering the tiny island alone and spent her nights engaged in various supernatural practices. The true history of the island is lost in the dark mists of time but tales of dragons, selkies, faeries, saints and miracles draw the visitors.The set is enhanced by a video-backdrop: interiors have flickering candlelight or the full moon beaming through a window, and exterior scenes are played out against a windswept Ionan beach or bleak moorland, complete with scudding sky. From stories of new age magic, otherworldly realms, alchemy and psychic abilities, all practised in shady back rooms of the temples belonging to secretive societies, our imaginations have often run wild, crossing victorian gothic aesthetic with the lure of a shadowy underworld.