A ghost story in the vein of the classics is coming to Olympic Theatre Arts’ stage on the most haunting night of the year.

“What better night than Halloween?” asked Director Ron Graham of Sequim’s upcoming show “The Woman in Black.”

He brings Stephen Mallaratt’s adaptation of the novel by Susan Hill to the stage starting tonight, Halloween, for a three-week run of suspense and scares. To add more mystery to the suspenseful story, Graham is keeping mum about his actors for the play.

“(It) draws on your emotions and our imagination,” he said paraphrasing one of the play’s lines.

“Part of that is by building suspense,” he said. “It’s helped by not knowing who the actors are.”

He did say the actors are well-known thespians and have performed with OTA before.

One of the actors plays Arthur Kipps, a turn-of-the-19th-century man plagued by a supernatural experience which occurred years earlier. To rid himself of the memory, he hires an actor to help him recreate the ordeal in an empty theater hall.

Kipps begins recreating his story by assuming six different roles, with the play moving from narration to enactment. The hired stage actor portrays a younger Kipps sent north to settle the estate of the an elderly recluse, the late Mrs. Drablow. In her home, Kipps encounters the Woman in Black. Without giving away the big reveal, a creepy series of events ensues, leading to a chilling twist.

“The Woman in Black” doesn’t feature blood and guts and Graham promises no one is going to touch you or jump out at you. He said the mystery comes from not knowing who is going to come out of the dark.

“Most people like to be frightened in a controlled situation,” Graham said. “They go to horror movies by the droves.”

Through rehearsals, he’s been asked by community members why he’s not revealing the actors’ names.

“It’s just that," he said. “The anticipation. The less you know, the more I can surprise you.”

He added that in an age of technology, where movies can show anything imaginable, he wants to do everything he can so the audience doesn’t know every detail and sense what happens next on the stage.

OTA and Graham request those who see the show not reveal the actors or Sequim’s version of the production to others.

The play runs through Nov. 18. For more information, call 683-7326 or visit www.olympictheatrearts.org.