The acoustics at the Stiwt are not good. Something invisible descends on the audience, swallowing up the sound from the stage. That was particularly unfortunate with The Dark Philosophers because so much of what made Gwyn Thomas great was in the richness of his language and that largely got lost, through no fault of the actors.
It was doubly a shame because what we were looking at was extraordinary. Let's start with the set, a seemingly meaningless jumble of brown furniture, wardrobes, cupboards, chests, all in a higgledy-piggledy pile. By the time entrances and exits had been made through the impossibly narrow doors it had somehow become the epitome of a Valleys' town hugging its hillside – absolutely magical.
Then the physical movements. Falls, swoops, bends, jumps or just plain synchronised door opening, it frequently took the breath away.
There was a real Continental feeling to the staging, at times reminiscent of Complicité's Street of Crocodiles or of a visiting Eastern European company from a few years ago. There were even times when Thomas seemed to have metamorphosed into Beckett as the dark humour underlying these stories of life in a South Wales mining community grew blacker.
I liked the idea of Thomas himself orchestrating events, even at times telling characters what to say next. There was a powerfully effective use of a puppet, all the better for not being overused.
Just when the darkness seemed to be becoming overwhelming the stage lit up with a stunningly realised Parkinson programme, complete with a fine Parky, a brilliant Billy Connelly and some of the best fast forward sound and visuals I've ever seen.
The eight strong cast worked together magnificently under Paul Hunter's direction.
This was an outstanding visualisation of Gwyn Thomas' lugubrious view of a small Welsh town, a million miles removed from the more famous one created by another Thomas. I just hope that I get another chance to see it where I can hear every word. At the moment I feel I've experienced it with a third shaved off and it's far too good for that to be the case.
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