As my birthday treat, I was lucky enough to receive tickets for The Woman in Black in London's Covent Garden. So yesterday, I headed off into the capital with a feeling of almost unbearable anticipation.
Susan Hill's source novel is one of my favourite books and holds a warm place in my heart. I have listened to it on audio book countless times and have finally ordered a hard copy, which sounds ridiculous, but sometimes you just need to have something in your collection. Even if you never crease the spine, just knowing it is there is somehow satisfying. It is a rather silly habit of mine, to 'back up' audio books with hard copies in the way you might burn a downloaded album to CD, even though you only intend to listen to it on your iPod. But I don't suppose it is a habit I shall break any time soon.
That is why one of these electronic reader things doesn't appeal to me in the least. Aside from some of the practical issues of carting it everywhere, I feel the same way about books that some people feel about music. Some people are horrified by the iPod, because they love the sensation of CDs or vinyl in their hands and being able to see their collection laid out in shelves or racks. Personally, that doesn't trouble me as the convenience of the iPod is indisputable. But with books, things are different. For while I am an avid audio book fan, I also want to see them, touch them, smell them, turn the pages. Looking at the crisp, untouched pages of a new book fills me with excitement and anticipation of the world I might find within, in the way that a megabyte of new downloaded material could never do.
Anyway, I digress. The reason I love The Woman in Black is because it is scary. Pure and simple. It is also beautifully written and has a simplicity and brevity to it that many authors should take notes from. But it is a ghost story that actually frightens its readers and that is something surprisingly few tales in the genre seem to achieve.
The writers of yesteryear seemed to have the knack - Edgar Allen Poe, MR James, Henry James, Charles Dickens - yet with the passing of the austere Victorian era, something else seemed to die. Imagination, creativity, a sense of the gothic. Perhaps as society became more open-minded and lashings of gore became not only permitted but expected, the delicate art of restraint was lost.
Maybe that is why it is so hard to find good ghost stories written in the latter half of the 20th century. And maybe that is why Susan Hill's much-loved story is such a triumph. Because although it is undeniably frightening, it is also written with a light touch and a real sense of menace that does not rely on big shocks and jumps.
I can't give too much away about the stage production, except to say that it does lean rather more towards shocks and jumps than the book does. It is a little brasher in its treatment of the ghost, but that is not a bad thing from the perspective of the theatregoer. We wanted to be scared and we bloody well were. I can imagine it would be very hard to transmit the book's quiet, creeping sense of dread to the stage, but they have done a very good job nonetheless.
The book was kind enough to provide some very useful events and devices to the theatrical version, plus there was some inspired use of simple special effects that had the audience on the edge of its seat.
I can say that the format of the theatre show takes a bit of getting used to. Instead of a straightforward retelling of Arthur Kipps' ghostly experiences, as in the book, the show sees Kipps approach an actor for help in presenting his harrowing tale to a small audience of friends and family, in order to unburden his soul once and for all.
He is soon caught up in the actor's enthusiasm to give an out and out performance and Kipps finds himself taking on the roles of the other characters in the tale, while the actor plays the main man himself, taking his cues from Kipps' lengthy manuscript.
Although this is a clever idea that turns the story into a neat two-hander with smart use of simple props, it took a while to get off the ground and I found myself glancing at my watch early on, wondering how they were going to get through the story in two hours if they didn't get a move on. Throughout the play, I did get the occasional feeling that the story was being rushed along and felt that if I hadn't already read the book, a few incidents might not have made perfect sense to me. But my companion, who did not already know the story, assured me that it was all completely understandable for a newcomer.
My fears soon proved unfounded anyway, for although the twist wasn't exactly difficult to spot, the show was an enormously entertaining and creepy experience that I would recommend to any fans of ghost stories (if not those with a heart condition) and I was very, very glad to have seen it.
It was a shame that the two women sitting in front of me found the need to confer almost constantly throughout much of the show. I couldn't really hear their whispers, but their constant leaning in and muttering really got on my nerves, to the point where I really wanted to bash their heads together. What can people possibly find to talk about so incessantly? This is an open request to all theatregoers - just watch the bloody show and compare notes afterwards. I find it incredibly rude when audiences can't just keep their mouths shut for a couple of hours and appreciate whatever spectacle is being presented for them.
Although The Woman in Black's audience was on this occasion generally a respectful one, it still astonishes me when people are incapable of just piping down and watching. During one scene, there was a rather prolonged period of silence which was evidently put there for a good reason. Yet there came the inevitable mutters and comments from the audience, spoiling the atmosphere of tension and reviving my lifelong desire to have compulsory Arsehole Detectors installed on the door of every theatre, cinema and concert hall in the land.
Anyway, that was not the show's fault and the tiny Fortune Theatre certainly delivered a healthy punch with this gloriously scary play, now in its 21st year. I recommend that all and sundry go to see it. But if you are of a nervous disposition, take a spare pair of trousers.
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