A large trunk, a narrow coffee table and two chairs are on the otherwise empty stage. Occasionally a box of papers, or, in the background, a graveyard with looming tombstones or a child’s nursery with a chair that rocks by itself. And, of course, fog throughout.

These elements, plus two actors, set the scene. One is William Repoley, playing an actor playing a man who is playing the part of Arthur Kipps, who came to the actor to have his story told. The other, Peter Thomasson, as character Arthur Kipps — who plays every other character in the mini-production he and the actor are putting on — complete the cast of “The Woman in Black,” a play that does much with very little.

It’s opening night of Flat Rock Playhouse’s “The Woman in Black,” a play running through Nov. 1. The audience is a mix of all ages and you can hear murmurs of, “This is going to be so scary!” throughout the theater.

The screenplay, adapted by Stephen Mallatratt from Susan Hill’s novel of the same name, is hard to follow at times — an actor playing an actor who suggests he plays the man who comes to the actor who could not act, but asks said actor to play his part in order for the story to be told. Yet that same man, who said he could not act, acts superbly as every other character in the play.

The play opens on a funny note — Arthur Kipps is attempting to read his story on stage next to a single light while the rest of the theater is immersed in darkness. The actor tells Kipps he is doing it all wrong.

“Draw on our emotions and our imagination!” the actor insists. “Have sympathy for your audience!”

The two decide to act out the story. The actor will play Kipps, and Kipps will play everyone else. The rest is left up to the imagination. Kipps, as a young solicitor, is sent to client Alice Drablow’s funeral. No one in Drablow’s town is willing to talk about her or her creepy-named home, Eel Marsh House, which is cut off from
the rest of the town during high tide.

As suspense builds, Kipps spots a woman with a wasted face at the funeral. He sees her, again, when he goes to Drablow’s estate to sort through her paperwork. While at the house, he hears horses and a carriage and a child’s scream.

Although he keeps repeating the mantra, “I do not believe in ghosts,” he can find no other explanation
for the events, which drag him into increasing terror as the play unfolds.

Near the end of the scenes at Eel Marsh House, Kipps is desperately pulling from quicksand a dog
named Spider, loaned to him by a friend from town to stave off the dread permeating the house. While chasing a noise, Spider got stuck in the marsh’s consuming trap. He finally pulls her free and sits back to catch his breath. He looks up to see the Woman in Black standing over him.

There is a flash of light — the woman vanishes, and he is left blubbering on the ground.

The stage is draped in darkness for most of the play — except for a flashlight weaving through the foggy air, or a spotlight on the actor playing Kipps, or a door, or a tomb, or a woman in black, who would appear with a flash of light and a shriek, followed by smothering darkness and silence.

There is a twist at the end, meant to leave the audience unsettled and worried, further blurring the lines between stage and story, actor and character, imagination and tangible, making it difficult to tell what’s what — and, therefore, what’s real.

As the audience left the Playhouse, some poked fun at one another. The veil between reality and imagination had lifted and it was back to real life. That was, until they stepped in the darkness outside and wondered what could be lurking.