Children’s play ‘Ghosts’ done in by the adults

In some ways, Max Bush's 1993 "Ghost of the River House" is a brave children's play.

The action takes place in and around a ruined house that hosts a ghost (Caity Rautenstrauch) who seems to want some kind of revenge on her immediate descendants.

She speaks only to 10-year-old Jenny (Natasha Lejbman), who feels her father (Jose Anthony) has long rejected her in favor of her brother (Ryan Meservey). She may well be right. And the ghost seems to be in her present predicament because of her past issues with men.

To the script's credit, the ending offers no easy solution. We're not certain just how chauvinistic and cruel Jenny's father is, but it's clear that Jenny is going to have to learn to deal with her world the way it is. Bush offers no fairy-tale solutions.

The strength of the evening lies in two natural-feeling performances (by the likable and mysterious Lejbman, as well as the mischievous and wholesome Meservey), and the skillful set design by Chris Marcellus and Molly Rautenstrauch. The pair give the tiny stage a welcomed sense of depth. With the use of simple items such as chairs, stairs, stones and foliage, they create an appropriately foreboding look.

But Brian Kral makes some huge missteps as director. Much of the acting is flat-footed, particularly by the adults. The mood of the piece is so one-note gloom-and-doom that the play's 50-minute running-time feels endless.

While it's obvious that the father's motives are meant to be ambiguous, Kral and Anthony's interpretation makes him so callous that he seems comic-book unreal.

Even the blocking is puzzling. There's so much upstaging going on (particularly by Lejbman), that you wonder if the director told the actors to roam at will.

The script is intriguing enough to make me hope to see it mounted again. But it needs to be not just rethought but reconceived. And, at the very least, reblocked.

Anthony Del Valle can be reached at DelValle@aol.com. You can write him c/o Las Vegas Review-Journal, P.O. Box 70, Las Vegas, NV 89125.