The Call of the Ghost
There is a deep magic in ghost stories, a spell that brews in our wonderfully irrational passion for life. We transcend the expectations of our hearts and minds: we relish the fear, the terror, the surprise. Something is out there, and instead of turning away, we embrace our mortality: we dance in the graveyard, we dress up in shadows, and sometimes we laugh in the darkness.
For hundreds of years writers have taken us by the hand and led us into old houses filled with apparitions: phantoms woven from memories and dreams and the dark core of our humanity. These tales are explorations of our souls, where characters cross the line between life and death, caught in situations that often draw out their deepest feelings. The supernatural teaches us what is natural: frailty, and strength, loss and recovery. The nurturing power of imagination.
We began Whispering Bones in 2011 with a goal of bringing some of these stories to light and have performed at a number of venues throughout the region to large and receptive audiences. This year once again our talented performers have created a show that is fun, scary and thought provoking.
This show has spooky, funny, and sometimes disturbing stories, but no gore. Suitable for middle-schoolers or older.
Join us! Kelvin Keraga, Producer
Dr. Betterov-Underhill and Friends
Here are some of the ghostly spirits that will appear in our 2026 show:
Isabel Coviello (Ere the Fire/After the Fire) is thrilled to be joining the cast of "Whispering Bones", and to share Agnes' story across the region. They were recently seen at Fort Salem Theater in "Jagged Little Pill" (Jo) and "Romeo and Juliet" (Juliet). Isabel was the 2025 Massachusetts National High School Musical Theater (Jimmy) Awards Nominee for their role as Belle in "Beauty and the Beast". Other favorites include "The Prom" (Emma), "Tuck Everlasting" (Winnie Foster), "Matilda the Musical" (Matilda, Miss Trunchbull (MA Jimmy Awards Finalist 2024)), and "The Music Man" (Zaneeta), among others. Isabel is an award winning actor, director, and musician from Central Massachusetts, and is currently a sophomore at Bennington College where they study environmental science, data science, and literature.
Kelvin Keraga, a.k.a. Dr. Erastus Betterov Underhill
(“The Room In the Tower”) is an actor, storyteller and writer living in Greenwich, New York. He is the creator of Whispering Bones and has produced and performed in it for the last fourteen years. Favorite acting roles include Bruce in Marie and Bruce, Basil in The Diviners, and the Fool in King Lear. He helped save Erica’s baby on All My Children (who unfortunately grew up to be a rather difficult son.) His play “The Stone Angel” was performed at Hubbard Hall this past summer. His story, “A Light Snow Falling” was a finalist in the Tiferet Journal Fiction Writing Contest, and he has performed for the National Storytelling Network. He is currently compiling a collection of his ghost stories.
Jewel Winant (The Tin Box) is thrilled to celebrate spooky season with “The Whispering Bones” tour. She earned her bachelors degree in theatre at UAlbany, has trained with Shakespeare and Company in Lenox, MA and is currently taking a hiatus from her MFA training with the Shakespeare Theatre Company Academy in Washington, DC. Having done over 40 productions spanning several states, past favorite roles include Rose in “Dancing at Lughnasa, Puck in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” (Hubbard Hall), Kate in “Taming of the Shrew” (Ualbany), and Hero in “Much Ado About Nothing” (STCA). She will be performing this fall in Hubbard Hall's production of Sylvia by A.R. Gurney.“By the pricking of my thumbs, Something wicked this way comes.” - Macbeth.
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Katherine Danforth-Hayes (The Sea’s Dead, Shannah’s Spell Closet) is a Hoosick Falls native and a graduate of SUNY Potsdam. She has appeared in Fort Salem Theater productions of “Pride and Prejudice” (Mr Bennet/Charlotte), “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” (Lysander), “Into the Woods” (Cinderella’s Mother), “Godspell” (Learn Your Lessons Well soloist), and “Romeo and Juliet” (Romeo). Other acting credits include “Twelfth Night” (Olivia), “Othello” (Cassio), “Peter and the Starcatcher” (Mrs Bumbrake), “A Box of Monkeys” (Mrs Ondego-Jones), “All’s Well That Ends Well” (Lafew), “Twelfth Night” (Viola), “Fefu and Her Friends” (Fefu), and “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” (Hermia) at Hubbard Hall. Formerly a proud staff member and youth production director at Hubbard Hall Center for the Arts and Education, Katherine now works at the Bennington Early Childhood Center in Vermont.
Shawn Paper (Ere the Fire/After the Fire) writes and performs in upstate New York, where he is drawn to the old and dangerous business of naming things: what we call each other, what we call what we've done, and how quickly a word becomes a fire. He wrote Ere the Fire which does not, he’d like noted, make him the King. His full-length play The Vessel received a staged reading at Bennington Theater earlier this month. He appeared this year as Torvald in Bennington Theater's A Doll's House, Part 2, and last summer as Oberon in Hubbard Hall's Summer Shakespeare production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. He will be performing this fall in Hubbard Hall's production of Sylvia by A.R. Gurney. He returns to Hubbard Hall with gratitude, a small wooden box, and a debt to the woman inside it.
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Jenny Wright (The Shiftie) started her acting career in N.Y.C., studying at Lee Strasberg’s Theatre Institute and learning the Meisner Method. While in N.Y.C she starred on Broadway in David Hare’s “Plenty”, in the Off-Broadway hit “Album”, with Kevin Bacon and Keith Gordon, and in various other Off-Broadway Productions at the Public Theatre. Jenny began her film career in “The World According To Garp” and Pink Floyd’s “The Wall”. She moved to California and pursued a career in film and television over the next two decades. (See IMBd: Jenny Wright). Most recently she played “Julia” in Hubbard Hall’s “Fefu and her Friends”. Jenny is a native of Cambridge
Special Guest Appearances:
Barbara Chepaitis (“Mama Draga”. Bennington Theater, The Eighth Step) is author of 12 published novels and 2 books of nonfiction, including SAVING EAGLE MITCH: One Good Deed in a Wicked World. She sometimes collaborates with her dogs to write books of Pomes and Songs for Hoomins. She's past director of the storytelling trio The Snickering Witches, and a regular co-host on Vox Pop, The Writer's Forum.
Janine Haas (“The Charming Shoes”, Hubbard Hall, Ashfield) is Artistic Director of Pauline Productions based in Ashfield MA. A professional Actress/Director/Arts Educator, she has worked with theatre companies throughout the Pioneer Valley and surrounds including TTP at Majestic Theater, New Century Theatre, Chester Theatre, Real Live Theatre, Silverthorne Theater, Berkshire Voices and Cambridge Theatre Co. She created the First Person Fresh Women's Solo Festival at Easthampton's Cityspace. Favorite roles include Madame Arcati (Berkie Award nominee for Blithe Spirit), The Poet (An Iliad), Vivian Bearing (Wit), Ruth (Collected Stories) and multiple roles (Mystery of Irma Vep) and (Parallel Lives aka Kathy & Mo Show). Eternal gratitude for my "partner in crime" Alice Barrett.
Battenkill Bollywood (Revenant, performed at Hubbard Hall and Bennington Theater): based in Washington County, New York, performs classic & original choreography inspired by a love for Bollywood films. During pumpkin-spice season, we often stir up trouble with the Deerfield Valley Witches, who dance Schüttel Deinen Speck in the style of the Wolfshäger Hexenbrut, and other witchy dances for Halloween in Wilmington and around the region. Our new dance, Revenant, explores a zombie-apocalypse world somewhere between Bollywood and MTV. Choreography by Gina Mammone Deibel, Michael Peters & Ines Markeljevic, with special thanks to Linda Morris.
Battenkill Bollywood: gina.dance678@gmail.com
Deerfield Valley Dancing Witches: tessamcauliffe@hotmail.com