Thursday, February 6, 1997
THEATER:
Play about relationships frightens, enlightens audiencesBy
Stephanie Sheh
Daily Bruin Contributor
Whether around a campfire or huddled in sleeping bags, people
come together in the dark with anticipation and excitement, because
everybody loves a good ghost story.
Tonight "Life Beneath the Roses," an adult ghost story, opens in
the darkness of the Bitter Truth Theatre in North Hollywood. The
cast and crew hope to entertain, frighten and enlighten the
audience with a story of love, loss and forgiveness.
The ghost is a woman named Elisabeth who, after losing her
husband at sea, falls into such a state of depression that she
neglects her son and he freezes to death outside their home. Two
hundred years later, when yuppy couple Catherine and Peter move in
and are making renovations on the house, Elisabeth haunts the place
because she is guilt-ridden. She cannot let her soul go to the
other side, because she needs somebody to forgive her for what she
has done.
During this weekend, Peter’s brother Nick and his wife Jenny
come for a visit. The couples are in the midst of all sorts of
personality conflicts when the ghost appears. But by the end of the
play, both Elisabeth and her living counterparts learn to love and
forgive each other.
Producer and actress Tammy Kaitz (Catherine) says one of the
things that attracted her to the piece is its exploration of human
relationships.
"I’m so attracted to the fact that there’s a normal wonderful
marriage between Catherine and her husband Peter. At the same time,
it shows the everyday stresses between a two- career family and
trying to raise a child, which is something I can personally relate
to," Kaitz says.
"Every time I read the story it just gave me goose bumps and
just made me so sad," Kaitz confesses. "I thought it was beautiful
and so sad at the same time that I just thought that it was such a
great role to sink my teeth into. I thought that if it moved me
when I read it, maybe it would have the same impact for the
audience."
"Life Beneath the Roses" should not only evoke strong emotions
among audience members, but also teach them some important life
lessons. Director Hope Alexander-Willis explains. "(The characters
are) restoring the house. They’re restoring the relationship. They
restore the ghost so that the ghost can feel free to move on."
Although the story has all the elements of a harmless campfire
tale  ghost, buried bones, haunted house  the play is
purposely labeled a ghost story for adults. Kaitz feels it is more
suitable for mature audiences.
"It really deals with mature relationship issues in terms of
problems in marriage and things that teenagers wouldn’t be
attracted to," Kaitz says, "I think that you’d really have to have
an adult sensibility about relationships and life to really get out
of it what the writer intended."
"It’s more along a psychological line than Casper the friendly
ghost," Alexander-Willis adds.
"Life Beneath the Roses" does not intend to be friendly, but
frightening, and one way to enhance the psychological was to put it
into a more intimate setting, namely a small theater like the
Bitter Truth Theatre, which only seats 45 people.
"The audience should feel like they’re sitting in the living
room experiencing this story with the family on the stage," Kaitz
explains. "(If it were on a big stage) they would feel distant from
it, so that emotionally it takes a lot longer to get attached. If
you’re sitting 20 feet away from some French doors that fly open
it’s going to give a completely different effect than if you are
sitting a hundred feet away."
Kaitz believes small theater creates a more intimate experience
for the audience members. However, the benefits of intimacy of
small theater extends to actors too. There is definitely a
different dynamic between the actors and the audience in a smaller
space as well.
"I love doing big theater too, but I love small theater and
having the audience right there," Kaitz says. "You can feel them.
When you’re on stage you can feel their energy. You can hear them
sigh, you can hear their emotions and there’s nothing else like
that."
But even though Los Angeles is filled with small theaters, Kaitz
thinks they often go unappreciated. This is one of the things the
she hopes the audience will take away with after seeing the
play.
"What I would like is two-fold," Kaitz says. "I would like them
to take with them the sense of how important honesty is in
relationships and forgiveness. And how valuable it is. And the
other fold is the art of small theater and how exciting and
rewarding it is to support something like that. So, I hope that we
move them and at the same time I hope that we excite them enough
that they want to open up their newspaper and go see other small
theater productions."
Alexander-Willis contributes, "I’d like the audience to walk
away wanting to go into their own lives and heal their own lives.
Maybe pick up the phone and call the brother they haven’t talked to
in a year."
THEATER: "Life Beneath the Roses" opens tonight at the Bitter
Truth Theatre. Tickets are $15-$18 for the general public and
$12-$15 for students. For more information call (818) 755-7900.