Ghost Light
When empty or unused, a theatre is termed “dark,” on the stage the ghost light playing its lonely vigil, illuminating the space so anyone who crosses knows the boundary and does not fall, and also, so the story goes, to offer comfort to the old ghosts which inhabit the theatre and to ward of those spirits which might be considered more dangerous, things wicked and malevolent which seek to disturb the balance of the mind.
A writer seeking direct experience for his novel, Mister Henry Webster is a newcomer to the London ghost club, swiftly taken under the wing of former children’s entertainer Edward Price, fallen on hard times and forced by circumstance to take lodgings with Mrs Sands, a widow who dislikes visitors after dark, yet Price is insistent that she admit Mister Webster, for if he wishes to experience an encounter with a ghost it is in the shadowy house of this reclusive and broken woman he will find them.
A traditional Victorian ghost story consciously fashioned after the works of M R James and his peers, writer Ian Tucker-Bell has captured the phrasing and formalities of the period in Ghost Light, with Philip Holden directing and playing Webster alongside Tucker-Bell, Nick Blessley, Cathy Treble and Pierse Stevens, the sinister atmosphere completed by the sound design and the almost total absence of light which unfortunately prohibits full appreciation of the splendid costuming.
Performed in blackout with only the flickering of the lamps carried by the cast to illuminate them and reliant almost totally on the spoken word, reflections, conversations and confessions, it is refreshing to see a Fringe performance where the parts are played by an ensemble whose ages and experience are appropriate for their characters, a considered piece of theatre which will appeal to an audience who appreciate literary substance rather than superficial flash in their horror.
Ghost Light continues at theSpace on Niddry Street until Sunday 17th August
