The Woman in Black
London Production at Center Rep
By: Victor Cordell - Nov 16, 2025
Many of us will remember camping trips as a kid, perhaps with a Scout troupe or with a group of friends. A highlight was always sitting around a campfire at night and roasting hot dogs and marshmallows. And as sure as the sun would rise in the morning, the ghost stories began. The only one I still remember is about the homicidal maniac with a hook for one hand that escaped from an institution. A couple was making out in a car near the institution that night. When the young man drives the girlfriend home and walks around the car to open the door, a bloody hook is hanging from the door handle. Now that was scary! And no matter how many times you heard it and knew it was just a story, it would still trigger a sleepless night.
The Woman in Black is a campfire ghost story for adults. Having played London’s West End for 33 years, the play’s longevity is testament to its appeal. A two-hander adapted for the stage by Stephen Mallatratt from Susan Hill’s gothic horror novel, it doesn’t horrify a theater audience in the same way that a nail-biter would a child. But the tremorous ambiance can feel creepy, and the loud shrieks, screeches, and thumps without warning are jolting.
The setup and structure are a bit odd, as an attorney named Arthur Kipps has written a tome about his frightening experiences on a business trip and hires an actor to help him prepare for a presentation of this unsettling suspense to his family. The opening is humorous as the (unnamed) actor tries to animate Kipps to make his presentation interesting. But Kipps balks, inducing much laughter from the audience as he reverts to the same dull-as-sliced-white-bread delivery with each effort.
A solution imposed by the actor is that he will play Kipps when rehearsing the narrative, and Kipps will play all of the other characters. With this device, the sniveling Kipps, portrayed by Ben Porter on this night, takes on a wide array of accents and affects to represent several different personas with immense brio. Meanwhile, James Byng performs “the actor” who takes on the part of Kipps with great gusto and far greater enthusiasm than Kipps himself.
In the plot, Kipps is charged to travel from London to an isolated town on the marshes to close out the affairs of the recently deceased Mrs. Alice Drablow. But Kipps finds that she left an abundance of papers that need reviewing, and he opts to overnight at her manor which lies across a causeway, accessible only by a low tide crossing, creating a further sense of vulnerability. Among the stacks of bills, grocery lists, and other inconsequential papers, he finds that Mrs. Drablow had adopted a boy, the son of her unmarried sister, which raises questions in his mind. Alone in this possibly haunted house, he also encounters the terrifying effect of finding things in the house have been moved when presumably nobody else is there.
The spare, drab set and spooky lighting enhance the harrowing feeling, accentuated by occasional appearances of a black apparition. Kipps’ anxiety is piqued as locals refuse to reveal whatever they know about Mrs. Drablow and the mysterious affairs surrounding the manor. And then there is the door in the house that has no apparent means of opening, yet opens by itself to reveal a nursery, long untouched. Trenchant verbal descriptions of the threatening marshlands speak of the grayness making indistinguishable the land, sea, and sky. Incidents of drownings heighten the threat. Even the small dog Spider, invisible to the audience, who accompanies Kipps is all but sucked into the mire, saved in risky desperation by Kipps.
A stage show lacks the scope and technology that movies have to create a truly horrifying experience. But given the resources of a live performance, this original London production of The Woman in Black serves as a major signpost on the bumpy road to horror.
The Woman in Black, adapted by Stephen Mallatratt and based on the novel of the same name by Susan Hill, is presented by Center Rep and plays at the Lesher Center, 1601 Civic Drive, Walnut Creek, CA through November 23, 2025.