Words by India Farnham | Production Images by Mark Douet
There is simply no other way for me to begin this review than to say I have a serious bone to pick with the people that age-rated 2012’s The Woman in Black movie, based on the 1983 Susan Hill book and starring the deceptively child-friendly Daniel Radcliffe, at a 12A. That movie, which I watched at 12 on DVD, mostly to impress my older brothers, is still one of the most truly terrifying things I’ve ever watched. And I’m now 23. I wish I could say I begin this way to lead into an explanation of how Stephen Mallatratt’s The Woman in Black stage show, the UK’s second longest ever running stage play, capitalises on our collective childhood fears – a dark corner, a tapping at the window, a door left slightly ajar – but I think it is mainly so someone will tell me I was very brave for going to the show last night. No pressure, I’ll wait.
Anyway, all pre-existing childhood trauma aside, The Woman in Black stage show, which is set in the early 1950s, begins slowly and quietly. Very quietly, in fact. Meet Arthur Kipps, played by the truly excellent John Mackay, an old man who is hoping to recover from a horrific experience from many years prior by putting on a play, and finally telling his story to his family and friends. He’s having trouble projecting his voice. Thankfully, he’s employed an actor, a self-assured young man about 30 years his junior and a paragon for logic and reason. As the pair push through their initial awkwardness, we learn through a series of rehearsals in an empty theatre (yep – it’s meta) that as a young man, Kipps was employed to manage the estate of the deceased widow Mrs Alice Drablow. Initially intrigued, he travels through a harsh storm (of course) to her isolated house in the bleak Crythin Gifford which can only be accessed when the tide is low enough (naturally). Suspended between the present and the past, story and reality, and utterly stranded, we watch as Kipps encounters a freakishly gaunt woman dressed all in black at Mrs Drablow’s funeral. From here on out, the play accelerates to a nightmarish pace and the mysterious woman in black has both Kipps and the audience in a chokehold as we discover the terrible truth of her quest for revenge.
Inquisitive and earnest, Daniel Burke’s younger Kipps remains upbeat until he experiences a sort of ego death and starts to question his doctrine of logic, e.g., if something looks and sounds like a ghost, maybe it is one. The tension between Kipps’ desire to know, to see, to feel, and his gradually strangling fear is most effectively embodied in Burke’s abrupt, jerking physicality; a door will be opened in one brash, forceful movement, as if a scale has suddenly been tipped and allowed curiosity to take the wheel. As the older Kipps, Mackay is convincingly completely traumatised: initially nervous and defensive about his experiences, and then, as they start unfolding before him in the impenetrable realm of memory, completely immersed in them, uncontrollably recalling every grim detail with maddening abandon. As the play picks up pace, becoming a game of waiting for the woman in black’s inevitable reappearance, its Mackay’s grief-stricken face that will anchor you to reality. The real horror here is not an awaiting jumpscare, but Kipps’ intense and sustained misery, the years he’s lost to his trauma.
It’s impossible not be wowed by the simplicity and tightness of the tricks that make this production work with such a limited cast. Much has been said of The Woman in Black’s minimal set, where clever miming allows a wicker basket to become a desk, a bed, a train carriage and a horse and cart – but it’s important to also note that as an audience member you’re not expected to simply imagine these transformations. Clever sound and lighting design (all thanks to Kevin Sleep, Rod Mead and Sebastian Frost) does that for you. The magic of The Woman in Black is that the whole theatre is involved in the performance; shadows are cast across all four walls, and the play uses the expanse of the space to its advantage, with action taking place away from the stage as well as on it. Fear is also an incredibly powerful imaginative tool – if you’re anything like me, you’ll find yourself becoming suspicious of an empty chair or a pause that’s slightly too long. You’ll be seeing ‘her’ everywhere and nowhere at once, and you won’t be able to look away.
The Woman in Black has been seen by more than seven million people in the UK, and, as the groups either side of me at the Theatre Royal can attest to, many of these visitors return to see it again. You see, there’s something deeply unknowable about The Woman in Black that goes beyond the jumpscares or the moments of high tension. It’s the same thing that drew Kipps back into that house, again and again, a twisted desire for some ‘strange beauty’ that meant he ‘could not run away from that place’. Are we really looking into the shadows to find the woman in black? Or are we hoping that somewhere, deep inside the blackness, we’ll confront the most vulnerable version of ourselves?
Eitherway, this is must-see British theatre and a legacy in the making. Go and see it, if only to prove to your 12-year-old self that you can.
The Woman in Black is showing at Theatre Royal until 6 December
