It’s time for another guest reviewer and a big thank you to arts journalists Andrew Clarke for this.
Ghost Stories by Candlelight, Hightide Tour, various venues, review at Two Sisters Arts Centre, 20th October 2023. The regional tour runs until 12th November before moving to The Globe in London for a short run ending on 25th November.
What better way to spend a late October evening than sitting in an atmospheric church, surrounded by flickering candles and being regaled by a series of unnerving ghost stories penned by some of the region’s most talented emerging writers.
Sitting in the Trimley arts centre, near Felixstowe, the audience is taken on a spectral journey across Suffolk and north Essex via four contemporary ghost stories linked by a newly composed song, The Curse of the Fen, which records the flight of a Peregrine Falcon over a changing landscape.
As the falcon flies over head, strange and unsettling events happen below in a very recognisable East Anglian world. The three writers (Nicola Werenowska, Shamser Sinha and Kelly Jones) along with songwriter Georgia Shackleton perfectly capture the way that past and present collide in exactly the same way that urban clashes with rural. This is modern East Anglia.
In these three separate, but linked, stories we see how ghostly echoes of our personal and collective past reach out to talk to us – not always in the most straight forward way. The staging of the stories by director Elayce Ismail gives the evening an eerie atmosphere using simple but creative lighting, including the effective use of hand torches, angle-poise lamps and coloured free-standing bulbs.
The three actors smoothly switch from character to character, each taking the main role in one tale, while doubling as background support and lighting operatives when not in the spotlight. Katie Cherry, Elizabeth Crarer and Loren O’Dair demonstrate a deft, believable artistry as they switch accents and personalities as the stories move from Pakefield to Pin Mill before ending up in Romford.
Hightide, started life as an annual new writing festival based in Halesworth before moving to Aldeburgh, dedicated to providing a platform for emerging playwrights. Now it is looking to provide a year-long presence in the county and wants to develop the region as a hot-house for new writing, particularly works which speak with a regional voice.
That voice comes through loud and clear in these three stories. Nicola Werenowska gives us the unsettling story of an isolated beach hut which has become a portal to the past, Shamser Sinha sets his characters in a dark, wooded landscape alongside the Orwell where witchcraft and the traditions of another age still hold sway and Kelly Jones reveals how love and friendship can be heartracingly scary.
At 75 minutes, this provides a tight, taut, highly entertaining evening. Great stories featuring recognisable characters in situations which could be unsettlingly real. Check out the tour dates and venues on the Hightide website and enjoy an early Halloween thrill.
Andrew Clarke
SUFFOLK THEATRE 