Based on the novel by Susan Hill, playwright Stephen Mallatratt brings a classic ghost story to life — and perhaps condemns us all to neverending nightmares and visions of a Woman in Black. A good horror story is interspersed with comedic relief and a good number of false alarms, where the real moments of terror can usually be seen coming a mile away. The London cast and crew of Woman in Black employ this formula with great skill.
It is amazing how many places you visit in a play with no obvious physical set changes; the actors, lighting designer, and sound designer create new places from thin air. That isn’t to say that the set designer has done nothing! The set is so cleverly laid as to allow for dynamic and fluid transition between this world and the other. It is truly a work of art that each piece falls into place.
No actor is named as playing the part of the Woman in Black, though we certainly all saw her and heard her; nor did the actor join the other two on stage for the curtain call. I wonder then, what we really saw…