Shake and Quake

A Ferndale thriller, an Arcata Playhouse earthquake musical

(Feb. 11, 2010) Tragedy, comedy, musical, historical-pastoral and all possible combinations crowd the stage, but one old standby — the thriller, the suspense drama — has mostly been ceded to movies and television, which have more ways to scare people.

That’s the conundrum faced by Ferndale Rep in presenting the thriller Wait Until Dark, opening this Thursday (Feb. 11). Though this play by Frederick Knott began on Broadway, it’s probably best known for the 1967 movie starring Audrey Hepburn as the young blind woman beset by strangers searching for hidden heroin.

Tom Conlon as Carlino and Alexandra Gellner as Suzy in Wait Until Dark, opening Thursday at Ferndale Rep.

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The Hepburn movie is on the Bravo list for film’s scariest moments, but how do you achieve that on stage, without quick cuts and lingering close-ups, cued by spooky music?

For the Ferndale production, director Jasper Anderton’s answer is: Make it real. “The challenge was to make this as realistic as possible,” he said in an interview last week. “That’s how we hook people.”

“The entire show takes place in a New York basement apartment. There are no scene changes, and this one place is all the audience sees.” To add to the realism, the set was designed not by a stage designer, but by an architect, Brian Morrison. “He designed a basement apartment,” Anderton said. “We devoted a lot of time to getting the details right.”

Lighting is also kept as realistic as possible. “Otherwise I felt it would jump out at people if there was anything that didn’t look exactly the way it was supposed to look.”

Once the environment is convincing, the actors use it to complete the reality connection. “Theatre has an advantage in creating suspense,” Anderton said. “It’s easier to draw the audience into the reality when they see live people up there on stage. Then you can really get to know the characters, and you watch them slowly realize that things aren’t what they seem to be.”

Not that there won’t be effects — there’s lightning and light bulbs breaking, as well as something like 32 different sound effects on a seven-channel mixing board. Light design is by Dell’Arte veteran Nick Trotter, and the sound mix is by Ian Schatz. Anderton is also intent on pacing the show for maximum impact. “In a thriller you really have to make sure the momentum stays up, and the tension stays tight.”

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