Metro Pulse/Backstage/The Woman in Black

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What:
The Woman in Black

When:
8 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 26 through Sat., Oct. 28. Also, a 2 p.m. matinee on Sat., Oct. 28.

Where:
Clarence Brown Theatre

Call 974-5161 for reservations and pricing.

UT upholds its reputation with a Halloween tale

by Adrienne Martini

Fear ain't what it used to be. As a kid, Halloween was a delightfully scary time, when ghouls and ghosties lurked behind every leafless maple tree. We'd spend hours cutting out cardboard pumpkins and black cats in anticipation of the big day, our excitement barely held in check. Now the presidential race is more terrifying than things that go bump in the night. The electric bill causes more shrieks of horror than a man in a hockey mask ever did.

I've tried to regain that old, kid-like glee in all things spooky without much success. Blair Witch made me just want to vomit—not from the film's thematic content but from the camera work. Last year I bedecked my office in Halloween swag but merely grumbled because I had to take so much time to take it down, which ended up being right before New Year's. The will to be scared is still in me but the ability to suspend my disbelief and fling myself into the spirit is sorely lacking.

My mother keeps telling me this will change when I have kids, their excitement will be contagious, yada, yada, yada. She's probably right—as much as it pains me to admit that. The kids behind me at Clarence Brown Theatre's The Woman In Black are truly what made the show take on a spine-tingling tone, which was only added once they started talking to each other in hushed whispers about what the outcome of the plot was going to be.

The script for Woman is loosely based on the novel by Susan Hill, a British writer who works in the mold of turn of the century storytellers like Henry James. Indeed, the setting is more or less the same as James' classic work of horror, Turn of the Screw. Both concern a house way out in the marshy bits of northeast England. Both concern the disappearance of a child and a house in which things are not quite right. And both take exhaustingly long in setting up the actual horror.

Stephen Mallatratt's staged adaptation of Hill's book tries to remedy the tedious and extensive exposition by turning Woman into a play within a play. Arthur Kipps, the man who was actually subjected to terror, hires an actor and a theater in order to learn how to read aloud his manuscript about his terror. The actor has a better idea—he'll play Kipps, the real Kipps will play the supporting roles, and all of the descriptive passages will be handled with sound, set and lighting. And from there, the play (finally) begins.

Clarence Brown Theatre is the perfect place to stage this technically intense play, which has been running for over 10 years in London. CBT has the fly system, the budget, the robotic lights, and the student-labor pool that will get the job done correctly. Witness the technical masterpiece that was Ghosts, with its rain showers, its moving sun-like orange ball, its river running through it. CBT can afford to hire the best designers in the country—with Woman, this shows.

Set designer Jeff Modereger, also a prof at the University of Vermont, has created an amazing world for Kipps and the actor. His design looks like any theater's attic, full as it is of old props and set pieces. The ones that need to function during the show do so admirably and his use of fabric to create some of the special effects is textbook. The show, however, would be nothing without Robert Perry's lights, which dazzle in their inventiveness and variety. They almost become another character—not a surprise given how impressive Perry's resume is. Also notable is Michael Ponder's sound design. This Knoxville recording studio owner has used his skills masterfully here, evoking auditory chills with the touch of a play button.

CBT's biggest problem of late—which was also seen in Ghosts—is in finding directors and casts who don't get caught up in all of the spectacle of the technical sleight-of-hand. With Woman, director Bruce Spears and actors Robert Hahn (Kipps) and David Brian Alley (Actor) do an admirable job of competing with the lights, set, and sound but never quite fill the space with the abilities they've shown in other local shows. Of course, I did see the show during a Sunday matinee—usually a low energy point for the actors that causes their performances to be a touch off from an evening show.

Still, in the end, it comes down to whether or not Woman was scary since a chilling touch of fear into the hearts of an audience is its whole raison d'être. The kids behind me sounded a bit quavery after the lights came up; during the second act they kept whispering instructions to the main character since they seemed to fear for his well-being. And their engagement in the play—their response, I think, is probably the most important.