Review: THE WOMAN IN BLACK at Desert Theatreworks

There's nothing like a creepy tale told well for these cool October nights, and Desert Theatreworks delivers with The Woman in Black. This two-hander is the second-longest running non-musical in London, and still scaring British audiences today.

The play was adapted by Stephen Mallatratt from Susan Hill's 1983 gothic novel. It opened in London in 1987 and transferred to the West End in 1989. To tell the expansive story on stage, Mallatratt has constructed a play within a play. We first hear an aging lawyer named Kipps (Michael Pacas) badly reading from a manuscript he has written. He has experienced a terrifying event early in his legal practice, and wants to relieve himself of the horror by telling the tale to others. He engages a young actor (Adam Genesta) to bring his manuscript to life. The young actor takes the roll of Kipps as a young lawyer, and Kipps then plays all of the other speaking roles in the story.

First of all, kudos go to both Genesta and Pacas for delivering 90 minutes of dialogue without pause, and seemingly without flaws. Genesta came to Desert Theatreworks two seasons ago after completing his BA in English. Artistic Director Lance Phillips-Martinez has worked with him in a number of shows, and Genesta is now at the peak of his game. He displays a gamut of emotions and vocal levels, necessary to keep interest in this intimate tale. Pacas is a newcomer to the Valley, but a name we will soon be hearing frequently. I met him socially a few months ago, but was unable to recognize the elderly bearded gentleman I saw on stage, so thorough was his transformation. Genesta has more dialogue and is the driving force of the piece, while Pacas gives credible dimension to eight or ten supporting characters. Their teamwork and timing is a reflection of the skills of director Daniela Ryan.

Mo Stein's simple set allows us to imagine the various locales. A scrim is flown in to give an interior feel to scenes set inside a mansion, and small tombstones, chests, blankets and boxes help us identify other locales. Phil Murphy's lighting lets us know whether we are watching two men discussing the manuscript in a theatre or whether we are actually in the story they are telling. The theatre scenes are lit in open white floodlights, while the story is lit in warmer pastels. I wish he had gone a bit further in making the actors look more haggard later in the story. Miguel Aballo's sound also helps us identify locations, though a couple of cues ended a bit abruptly, as if they had been designed to fade but didn't.

Three stagehands (Angus Heath, Art Healy, and Violet Heath) visibly move boxes and props around the stage, and occasionally visually represent additional characters. An effort was made to give each of them a character, and their visibility is to remind us that we are watching a story being enacted on a theatre stage. However, there were moments when the two main actors hadn't moved in a while and the stagehands were a flurry of activity, and they took away from the focus of the story being told.

For me, the most amazing moment of the evening was a rocking chair that creaked perfectly - sometimes with a dead woman's ghost (Sydnie Safoyan) rocking in it, sometimes rocking itself. Whether it was pure luck or the result of some very skillful maneuvering, the sound of that chair rocking was damned creepy!

The Woman in Black runs through October 29. Tickets and further info at www.DTWorks.org,

http://www.DTWorks.org

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