The Akron Civic Theatre, a Knight Arts grantee, and Neos Dance Theatre, also a Knight Arts grantee, really knew what they were doing when they decided to come together for a night of Dracula (the silent film “Nosferatu” and Neos’ “Count: The Legend of Dracula”) back-to-back on Saturday, November 1, the night after Halloween.

It was nice for both sides to have such a large crowd to see the event. When we drove up to the theater, we had a hard time finding a place to park. The nearby lots were full. That’s one of the things that collaboration can get you, it would seem – a bigger audience for more exposure.

The attendees got their money’s worth. Most people, one imagines, had never seen a silent movie like “Nosferatu,” which was done in Germany in 1921. Or saw it performed on a large screen with a huge organ like the Mighty Wurlitzer as played by Sarah Kaufman, who seemed to have it exactly timed to the unfolding scenes as they flashed across the screen.

Cinematic history aside, the film gets the job done. It conveys the sense of eeriness and tension as the nefarious vampire Dracula, here called Orlok, drains the blood out of the unwitting Thomas Hutter (who is sent to Transylvania to discuss a land deal with the count), and Hutter’s wife Ellen (who suspects Orlok/Dracula and tries to save her husband but loses to the count’s mesmerizing ways).

The word Nosferatu apparently means “Bird of Death,” probably owing to the blood-sucking count flitting in and out of rooms and aboard ship as he sails for England while attacking all those around him. As with any upstanding Victorian novel like Bram Stoker’s “Dracula” – and movie or ballet based on it – Dracula gets his in the end, disappearing in a puff of smoke as the sunlight reaches him.

Some people may have been put off by the sometimes stilted acting (from some very fine actors who, for the most part, were stage actors and used to acting large rather than for the smaller space of a camera’s world). And they may have thought it strange that you often couldn’t tell if it was day or night, and that the lighting of the scenes was at times grainy and bluish and at others yellowish. Then one remembers that cinematography had, and still has in some respects, a long way to go. If you take the film for what it is, the changes in coloration helped to create mood. It was also interesting to see that the fade-to-black technique wasn’t developed as well either, with scenes seeming to jump (and thus causing a few people to have difficulty following the narrative).

Still it was a great cinematic experience, especially watching the filmmakers develop special effects to evoke the macabre. The German Expressionists certainly knew how to achieve that: Orlok would seemingly rise out of the floor. Nifty for back then.

Neos Dance Theatre, “Count…The Legend of Dracula.”

Neos brought us to the modern, contemporary dance world, fashioning its own tension and emotional content in a hip, multimedia way. No problem with merging media and cinematic and dramatic stage technique.

Bobby Wesner, artistic director of Neos Dance Theatre and creator of “Count: The Legend of Dracula,” collaborated with Emmy Award-winning videographer and documentary director Andy Gardner and Emmy Award-winning writer Michael Thomas. They conjured up a monumental multimedia event – solid, terrific dancers; dense and rich choreography; a varied musical soundtrack that combines rock, pop and industrial music; video imaging that helps to ground the setting with projections of the count’s castle on one hand and close ups of dancers to show what they are doing and how they feel about it on another; and the innovative staging that has become the hallmark of Neos Dance Theatre, including dense fog rolling across the stage, a large carriage crossing the stage for narrative movement, and a fainting couch to add to the emotional toll on the frantic wife.

The company worked quickly, too – not rushing the tempo, but by shortening the intermissions to just a few minutes. They helped get the audience out of the theater. A couple of people were overheard saying that they couldn’t wait it out – but wished they could.

Neos got a large and deserved standing ovation – and from a sizable crowd. The company wants a greater presence in the Akron area. This should help with that goal, and get them the audience they deserve in the process.