MOLINE, ILLINOIS (February 28, 2020) — The Black Box Theatre presents Jeffrey Hatcher’s Turn of the Screw March 26 through April 5. Based on the Henry James book, it is a tale of suspense, horror, and repressed sexuality. A governess journeys to a lonely English manor house to care for two recently-orphaned children. However, she is not their first governess. Her predecessor, Miss Jessel, drowned herself when she became pregnant by the sadistic valet, Peter Quint, who was himself found dead soon after under mysterious circumstances. Now the new governess has begun to see the specters of Quint and Jessel haunting the children, and she must find a way to stop the fiends before it is too late. One frightening question tortures the would-be heroine: Are the ghosts real, or are they the product of her own fevered imagination?
The cast includes Matt Walsh (playing four roles) and Kayla Pulliam, and will be directed and designed by Lora Adams, co-founder and Artistic Director of The Black Box Theatre. “I am delighted to have Matt back on our stage and to introduce Kayla to our audiences. She is new to the area and we are thrilled she has chosen to do her first show here at the Black Box,” said Adams.
Tickets are available at theblackboxtheatre.com. Thursdays for $13 and $16 all other performances.
The New York Times said of the play, “The key word is imagination. In this beautifully executed adaptation, the audience [is] forced through subtly ambiguous shadings, to vividly project what is cleverly left unseen and unspoken. A dazzling act of the imagination. Hatcher has pushed James' clever turn to its furthest degree.”
The Black Box Theatre is a 501 (C)(3) non-profit theatre founded in 2017.
