"Fairy tales are the purest and simplest expression of collective unconscious psychic processes," wrote psychoanalyst Marie-Louise von Franz, in "The Interpretation of Fairy Tales."

Theater director Mary Zimmerman is well aware that such famous psycholanalysts as von Franz, Carl G. Jung and Bruno Bettelheim have found a cache of psychological symbolism in tales beginning with "Once upon a time ... " But Zimmerman leaves the psychic probing to the shrinks. She insists her own goal in "The Secret in the Wings," a theater piece based on obscure and familiar European fairy tales, is to tell her audience some captivating yarns.

"What I'm trying to do is listen to a story and get out of its way, and present it in the most beautiful and complex manner but with a simple, accessible surface," proclaims Zimmerman. She wrote and directed "Secret," which begins previews at the Seattle Repertory Theatre tomorrow.

"I did have a very, very influential teacher in college, the Jungian psychoanalyst Dr. Leland Roloff, who now lives in Seattle," the director mentions. "He spoke about archetypes all the time, so I'm receptive to that. But in my theater work, my conversation is with the [story] itself, not how it's been interpreted. "

Zimmerman's unique, visually captivating approach to dramatizing myths and legends has been welcomed here. Seattle Rep previously hosted her quirky retelling of Homer's "The Odyssey," and her piece inspired by a lionized Italian artist-inventor ("The Notebooks of Leonardo").

Also seen here: "Metamorphoses," Zimmerman's entrancing reverie on stories from Ovid. It went on to a touted Broadway run and earned Zimmerman a Tony award for directing.

Zimmerman remains, however, anchored in Chicago, a city steeped in theatrical storytelling. She continues to teach in the Department of Performance Studies at her alma mater, Northwestern University. And two "home" theaters commission her original work: the flagship Goodman Theatre and The Lookingglass Theatre, an outfit dedicated to adapting nondramatic literature for the stage.

"The Secret in the Wings" was first conjured in 1991 as a late-night show for Lookingglass — and ran a mere 12 nights. When the company asked her in 2003 to revive it, Zimmerman was surprised.

"We had a video of the old performance and I'd think, 'I can't believe you people want me to do this again!,' " she recalls. "In the first go-round I had these long, long sections where things were staged in a collage way, without language, and they'd just go on forever. And we had virtually no set."

The new, 90-minute version, she assures you, "is a lot tighter. We have a real set now. But paradoxically enough, [two] of the original nine cast members will be in the Seattle run."

"Secret" begins "with a little girl being baby-sat for the night by an ogre who lives next door, a bit of a 'Beauty and the Beast' updating. She's hearing stories from the baby-sitter, but she also becomes characters in them."

Like many a seasoned yarn-spinner, the director likes to guard her surprises. "I try not to tell people in advance what all the stories are in the show, or the order they're in, because I like there to be a certain lostness." She quotes her teacher Frank Galati, a major director in his own right: "You have to lose the trail of breadcrumbs in the woods in order for enchantment to occur."

In its recent Chicago, New Jersey and Berkeley runs, critics have noted a powerful sense of "foreboding and menace" in "Secret," which includes macabre images of murder, cannibalism and hints of sexual violence which may be unsuitable for kids.

But Zimmerman, who has loved fairy tales since she was a small child, doesn't think the production is strictly for grown-ups: "It doesn't have a happy-happy feeling, and if you're very little it could be kind of scary.

"But I really think the ideal audience member," she suggests, "is a 12-year-old girl. In Chicago, these girls would come see it over and over and over. I knew an 11-year-old who saw it 15 times.

"The piece does show how childhood can be scary and out of control. It's rich and rewarding, sure, but also frightening. And I think pre-adolescent girls understand that immediately."

Misha Berson: mberson@seattletimes.com