Debbie Bennett (foreground) plays practical Philomena, who visits new neighbor Beth, played by Amanda Spellman, in Fells Point Corner Theater’s haunting play 'The Quickening'. Photo by Shealyn Jae Photography 

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According to Wikipedia, “quickening” refers to the moment in pregnancy when “the woman starts to feel or perceive fetal movements in the uterus…the word, ‘quick,’ originally meant ‘alive.’”

In award-winning local playwright Mark Scharf’s modern gothic tale, The Quickening, it’s the moment when one’s spirit — what constitutes one’s true self — takes possession of the body. Before that moment, the fetus is but an empty vessel, waiting for the soul to arrive.

The question this play raises is, whose soul?

Scharf’s two-hour, two-act play, now at the Fells Point Corner Theatre, begins with a device that this reviewer is not a huge fan of, where an actor speaks directly to the audience, providing exposition, setting mood, etc.

As playwright Anton Chekhov noted, “Don’t tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.”

That being said, the tactic works well in the play, as Philomena, played by Debbie Bennett, plants the “comforting” thought in the minds of the audience that if our spirit is separate from our brains and body, it stands to reason it may continue on after said body is no more.

We are left to wonder, how will this concept be applied in the play?

And left to wonder we are — for a rather lengthy period — as we are introduced to husband and wife Matt and Beth as they settle into their new home in Richmond, Va., amidst a formidable array of yet-unpacked boxes. One could say the boxes are a metaphor for the couple’s lives, as there is a mystery to be revealed — one packed away since the days of the American Civil War.

A haunted house?

After being served about 20 minutes of Beth and Matt’s domestic life — wherein we learn that (1) the family dog, Tyler, has gone missing, (2) Beth is pregnant and not a fan of unpacking boxes and closing front gates (hence, the missing dog), and (3) Matt is an uber-enthusiastic Civil War reenactor, complete with gray Confederate uniform — the audience is treated to the play’s first spooky moment:  A strange boy appears at the back door.

Is he a ghost? He quickly disappears.

Next, a more down-to-earth visitor, Philomena, or “Phil” as she prefers to be called, arrives at the door, armed with a “passion for physics” and a plate of welcome-to-the-neighborhood homemade cookies.

In the ensuing dialogue, it becomes clear that Phil’s role is to stand in for the audience, offering both the skeptic’s point of view (she’s a mathematics teacher, who understands that two plus two always equals four) and the believer’s faith in otherworldly matters.

Speaking of believers, it is at this point we are introduced to Beth’s mother, Rosemary (Marianne Gazzola Angelella) and her own ghost story, where an encounter as a child with the spirit of a murdered woman reveals her family’s particular sensitivity to a netherworld just beyond ours.

Actress Angelella is a force to be reckoned with on stage, as she truly inhabits her character, just as the ghost of Samuel Brodie would inhabit Beth’s unborn child.

Startling sounds and more

In the play’s second act, things begin to take off (with help from lighting and sound designers Tabetha White and Devyn Deguzman), as the thunder and lightning of a summer storm are equated to the exploding bombs and gunfire of a battle betwixt the Blue and the Gray nearly 150 years ago.

The creative team brought together in this co-production of Fells Point and The Collaborative Theatre does an excellent job in making things go bump in the night. The audience enjoys a jolt or two of sudden surprise as The Quickening moves to a creepy crescendo.

Amanda Spellman finds her stride as Beth, a woman (nearly) possessed, bedeviled by screeching cell phones and a husband seemingly more interested in his dog than in his wife’s tortured psyche.

David Shoemaker does well in the fairly one-note role of Matt, who, as an engineer, has a fittingly matter-of-fact view of the world, a view with no room for ghostbusting.

Bennett’s Phil is appropriately nonplussed by the odd goings on — from inexplicably falling portraits, to the very modern issue of whether preserving Confederate monuments (and memories) is more about history than about racism.

By play’s end, a new soul has been welcomed into Beth and Matt’s family, but just how new that soul is remains to be seen.

Bennett’s Philomena makes a final appearance in the play, once again addressing the audience about the nature of life, who we are, where we go when our bodies finally pass, and the comfort that may be gained in believing that death is not the end, but a sign of a new beginning.

Kudos to director Ann Turiano in successfully bringing a chilling slab of Halloween fright to a summer’s audience.

The Quickening

continues its run at Fells Point Corner Theatre at 251 S. Ann St. through July 1. For more details, ticket information, etc., visit www.fpct.org. Tickets are $19 to $24.