Richard Wilcocks
writes:
Trio Literati’s and
Theatre of the Dales’s current production of Dylan Thomas’s beautiful, funny
and moving radio play from 1954 - Under Milk Wood – is one of the best I have seen on stage,
intelligently directed, with much attention to detail, and impeccably acted.
Every character lived life to the full in front of the audience last night in the New
Headingley Club, even the dead ones, and it did not matter that the lighting
was not up to playhouse standards, because Trio Lit and Theatre of the Dales
can survive very well without it if necessary: they are veterans of pub and
club rooms.
The play was sliced to
about half of its original length by Adrian Metcalfe and David Robertson, and
all the stitching was invisible. It was a wise, if not inevitable, move to manage without costumes
and set (expensive, hard to cart around) although the cast wore a variety of
striped tops to bond them together. They relied on the sort of
movement which can be done in a small performance space, and the usual actor’s
repertoire of voice, gesture and facial expression. It worked all the time.
Nothing was ever touch-and-go.
The Welsh accents sounded
authentic enough to me, nicely varied to fit each member of the population of
Llareggub. To pick out individual performances in a strong ensemble piece is difficult, but I have to record how much I loved the Reverend Eli Jenkins
and his prayer, Butcher Beynon with his macabre sense of humour, Mr Mog Edwards
the writer of letters, Mrs Pugh, at constant risk of ingesting poison, and Mrs
Ogmore-Pritchard. I was moved to tears as always by Captain Cat’s memories of his dead
lover Rosie Probert, and captivated by Myfanwy Price.
The cast included all of
the Trio – Maggie Mash, Jane Oakeshott and Richard Rastall – together with
Theatre of the Dales founder David Robertson and Arif Javid, a terrific Nogood
Boyo.
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