Home » The Woman in Black by Susan Hill at Newcastle Royal Theater Review and Plot Summary

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Yes, the cinema is good but it's not the theater. Televised movies are good but they're not the theater. A two dimensional representation of three dimensions is alright but there is clearly something missing. Without this something, Woman in Black would be nothing.

The Woman in Black is a play based off the novel of the same name by Susan Hill and adapted for stage by Stephen Mallatratt. It is essentially a ghost story with a few humorous touches. Poor old Arthur Kipps goes off on a simple task of monotonously and laboriously sifting through the late Mrs Drablow's mountains of unexciting paper work. Mr Kipps's trip was set to be as exciting as a ten hour recital of the entire Oxford Dictionary of Mathematics, read by an old man with an excessively deep voice and an incessant cold. Were it not for the a haunted castle, a chilling event and, of course, the Woman in Black herself.         

The other observation I made was that the second act was better than the first. If you were only to watch the first act you would leave without getting at all scared. The question on everyone's lips at the end of the first act was: that supposed to be scary? Just wait until act 2...

The scary is more due to suspense and tension than gore. They get you right on the edge of your seat. You're taken in by the actors slow movements, the look of terror they wear,  the lights dull, the eire silence that ensues and then, suddenly, a blood curdling scream. You get a surge of adrenalin and jump out of your seat as if you have seen a ghost. Then you take a deep breath and relax, it's over. At which point you actually see a ghost and it sets you off again.