The scene which I felt had the largest amount of impact on the audience was the one when the two male actors were going to the house of the old lady to find her will and legal and financial documents as she has passed away and no details were left behind about what she wanted to give to various people.
I felt as a part of the audience that the parts, which had the most emotional impact on the audience, were the parts when they were on their way to her house and were going by horse and cart. The reason why this was very scary and tense is because the lighting was very dark and there was just one bright spot light focusing on the main characters and there were not many sound effects apart from those of the horse’s hooves and those of the birds and insects in the woods! The other part was when they were in the house and the woman in black was in there with them but they didn’t know it. The part which had a lot of impact was when the man went into a room in her house where there was a nursery and they were looking for some items belonging to the woman and then they left the room and the woman in black went into the room after and it was all messed up and she was sitting on the baby rocking chair looking out to the audience and all you could see was her face and nothing else which had a huge emotional and scary impact.
The part, which I felt especially had the most emotional impact on the audience, was the part when the woman in black was in the house with the other two characters but they didn’t know she was there and she was following them around and when they left one room she would then go in there and move every thing around and mess it all up to confuse them. The part, which springs to mind when I think of this, is when the old man was in the child’s nursery and then he went into another room so the woman in black went in after him and was sitting on the child’s rocking chair and had messed up all of the clothes belonging to the child and she was rocking frantically on the chair which put the audience all on edge as it was a very bloodcurdling part which. This was the part, which I felt added extra tense to the audience!
Another part which I felt had impact and added tense to the play was when they were towards the end of the play and the man was trying to get back home from the ‘haunted’ house because he had done every thing he wanted and he could not find his horse and cart to take him home so he took a slow walk then without warning the horse and cart came rushing down the path and trotted past him and frightened him and added huge amounts of impact to the audience.
Finally, the way in which the actors moved added impact to the whole play because they moved very quick and sharp through out but when the woman in black in the same scene they changed their ways and their actions were very close and careful about what they did.
In conclusion, I think this was a very good play and there were large amounts of emotional impact and a lot of bloodcurdling moments which put the audience on edge!
In the play there are three main characters their main roles in the play are Mr. Kipps, The woman in black and another actor. These are the only three actors in the play but they learn to improvise and to adapt and play all of the other characters in the play as well. For example Mr. Kipps is the man who has to go and sort out the elderly lady’s house who has passed away but it is haunted so this frightens him!
The way the actors spoke and the way in which they portrayed their voices also had an impact as they spoke with low quivering voices when there was tension in the audience and they then changed and spoke with loud, strong and bold voices when there was a more open atmosphere within the audience.
The way in which the actors moved during the play also had an effect because when the atmosphere was more open and overt the actors movements around the stage were a lot more wide and dramatic, where as when the actors were in the same place as the woman in black they changed and as they were scared their actions became more closed and covert and were a lot lees exaggerated.
There were in which the actors acted and their relationship towards each other was very natural and there were no abnormal or strange actions when they were around each other. Their actions and their movement around each other was very typical when they were in a normal situation but when they were in the ‘haunted’ house they suddenly changed and their relationship towards each other became very close and they were a lot less humorous!
And finally, the characterisation of the actors was also very good and was done at a very high standard. Even though there were three main characters and only two of the were changing their role all the time. The actors still adapted and changed to their next character as soon as possible and they immediately changed the way they spoke, acted and their total life style.
These four things helped to add impact on the audience because as they were changing around so quickly we had to get used to and adapt to it all and even in some cases it was rather scary the way they changed so quick it became shock!
