Only one play has ever challenged Agatha Christie’s “The Mousetrap” for longevity on London’s West End. Susan Hill’s macabre thriller “The Woman in Black,” in Stephen Mallatratt’s 1987 stage adaptation, was performed there from 1989 to 2023, for 13,232 performances, becoming the second-longest-running non-musical play in West End history.
Weston Theater Company celebrates autumn with this thrilling tale of “The Woman in Black,” starring David Bonanno and Lucas Dixon, and directed by Jacob Basri, Oct. 2-20 at Walker Farm Theater in Weston.
Young solicitor Arthur Kipps is sent to a remote English town to settle the affairs of the recently deceased Alice Drablow. While there he unwittingly unravels a sinister and haunting mystery. With each revelation, this chilling adventure unveils unexpected secrets of a past that refuses to stay buried.
“I think there is something about — in a totally safe environment — choosing to scare yourself that I think actually connects you more deeply to the things you hold most dear, the things you cherish most, and the people you care the most about,” Basri said. “And you’re more likely to form deeper bonds with the people you’re near.”
And, though Basri neglects to mention it, it’s just plain fun.
“It’s not bloody and gory. It’s suspenseful,” Basri said. “And it’s a mystery.”
The tale begins in an empty Victorian theater with the elderly Arthur Kripps reading from a script he has written that relives the macabre events that completely changed his life. A young actor he has hired to help him dramatize it enters and criticizes Kripps’ delivery. After some debate, they agree to tell the story with the actor as the young Kripps, while Kripps plays all the other roles.
What ensues is a transformation of the imagination.
“I think one of the most amazing things about it is what a celebration of theater-making it is,” Basri said. “It’s a play where two actors transport you to a million different locations through a number of different circumstances with essentially a trunk and a couple of chairs and some lights and some sounds — and of course, some really vivid language.
“It’s a play where the language is one of the most ornate things on stage,” Basri said. “And that language transports you into this haunting story. One of the primary things that excites me about it is what a beautiful love letter to theater it is, and what an invitation it is to an audience to engage their imagination and to viscerally connect with two actors.”
With such meager resources and only two actors, the biggest challenge is to make the play scary. Initial rehearsals lack the elements of lighting and sound that will eventually figure in the story.
“We’re all very excited to get into tech where we will be joined by the rest of our collaborators to see what impact those elements have on the larger atmosphere of the play, and also to make some of the most unexpected spine-tingling moments and to really, really realize them,” Basri said.
Still, in most ways, it’s just like any other play.
“We just ‘follow the breadcrumbs’ from the script and try to be as truthful about them as possible,” Basri said. “We’re essentially kind of breaking it down moment by moment, putting one foot in front of the other, and we’ll go back and put it together and focus on telling the story of the play. We are trusting the material — and the material is scary!”
“It really grips you.”
The success of the play really hinges on the two actors.
“So much of the responsibility really falls to them and their skills as storytellers on the stage,” Basri said. “And we are fortunate to have two really wonderful actors in this play.”
Bonanno, in addition to more than 50 Weston productions, appeared in the original Broadway “The Light in The Piazza,” the Chicago companies of “Ragtime,” and the National Tour of “I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change.” Dixon was in Weston’s “What the Constitution Means to Me,” in addition to appearing regionally in “The Game,” “The Show on the Roof” and “Assassins,” among other credits. Basri’s work has appeared at Lincoln Center, Urban Stages, The Flea, Ensemble Studio Theatre, and Williamstown, among many.
“The major tool in this play is really the imagination, and David and Lucas are really able to viscerally imagine in a way that helps the rest of us as listeners also enter into the story,” Basri said.
“The Woman in Black” was written for a traditional proscenium theater like Weston Playhouse, which remains temporarily out of commission after flooding two years ago.
“We are doing it in a proscenium figuration in Walker Farm, a ‘black box’ theater,” Basri said.
Basri and scenic designer Marcelo Martínez Garcia “sat in the theater for a long time, and a huge amount of our design time was just about sitting in that theater and imagining how does Walker Farm become an old Victorian proscenium theater?” Basri said. “So how do we do that and really embrace the space that we are in?
“I’m proud of the solution we came up with,” Basri said. “There is something about the magic of theatrical transformation being completely embraced, and really going to see a play that is not a sitcom, it’s meant to be a play, and getting to celebrate the art of the actor that opens the door to a really, really thrilling ride.”