2) National Theatre Wales- 'The Village Social' review

‘Because beneath even the most respectable exterior will lurk some strange impulse, some irrational craving, some inappropriate imagining.’

This is National Theatre Wales’s first visit to Neath Little Theatre, and it seems the whole community has turned out to witness the event. Following a highly successful Edinburgh Fringe with their devised piece ‘The Dark Philosophers’, National Theatre Wales return to their homeland with a surreal musical theatre piece. Created by Welsh playwright Dafydd James and fellow writer Ben Lewis, it has been described as ‘The Vicar of Dibley meets The Wicker Man’, a bizarre yet accurate comparison to which the piece most certainly lives up to. Music is at its heart, and is a device often utilised to represent contrast. Music becomes the precipitating factor for the descent into psychedelic hysteria, whilst previously it had represented the more traditional aspects of community life.

We are welcomed into the village hall of Cae Bach, walking directly into the scene with characters milling about preparing the hall for tonight’s event. The set creates the perfect atmosphere; balloons, flags and a ‘glamorous’ gold stripped tinsel backdrop all work to convince us of an authentic, poorly decorated community hall. We are greeted by Lawrence (Darren Lawrence), joined by Yvonne (Carys Eleri), Lisa-Jên (Rebecca Harries), Dave (Oliver Wood) and Jean (Sue Roderick), who welcome us to Cae Bach’s autumn social. The piece adopts a Brechtian technique by ‘breaking the fourth wall’, forcing the audience to become a part of the scene with characters acknowledging the audience’s presence as they happily wander from stage to audience. What struck me most of all, was how easily the audience bought into the pantomime act. Prompted by a single arm movement, the audience enthusiastically joined in the action consequently becoming the community of Cae Bach. As the piece progresses, we are made aware that we are waiting for a special guest, Madam Isis. Due to her late arrival the characters begin to stall, singing and relating myths allegedly associated with Cae Bach. Although these stories may seem irrelevant, they are obviously being set-up for a greater purpose later on. Dion (Gwydion Rhys), Lawrence’s son, brings on a selection of youths and together they perform a song that is perhaps overly long and slightly irrelevant. Unfortunately, several plot plants are heavily dropped into the light-hearted script, which is slightly jarring.

The piece then slips into the Horror Film genre, when a power cut affects the whole hall. We as the audience are placed in the same position as the characters onstage, continuing our role as the community of Cae Bach. This is done subtly with lighting that is so smooth you don’t even realise the change. Realistically and cleverly lit by candles, we witness the characters expressions as a veiled, hunched figure emerges from the back of the hall. This is obviously Madam Isis, who apologises for being late on account of her Sat Nav being broken and having to rely on the spirits to guide her to her destination. At first Madam Isis begins as a poor medium, relying on the gullible Yvonne to feed her the information she needs to perform a badly prepared act. Then it begins to get a bit more sinister. She relates information about the characters that is completely personal; things that only they themselves would know. Even as Madam Isis begins to reveal the true gory details of that ‘bad situation’ previously alluded to, the audience continue to laugh, whether awkwardly or not, it seems they have failed to grasp the severity of the situation. Madam Isis then disappears in true pantomime style: all that is left is a scarf and a puff of smoke.

After this, characters begin to leave one by one returning later in various excessive states. Jean enters with a dead dog on her head, followed by Dave dressed as ‘the small girl who danced herself to death’ depicting a story earlier told by Lisa-Jên. Yvonne joins the stage again representing an earlier story of a disgusting monk, whilst Lisa-Jên and Lawrence depict an act of sexual lust. Before long, the stage is a host of excess and hysteria, but the audience continue to laugh. The significance of the symbolic Bacchus head hanging on the tinsel backdrop is obviously lost on the audience: the characters are blatantly being affected by the ritual and madness of the God Dionysus. The scene reaches its climactic point when the God himself enters, lusting for a sacrifice. The characters must choose which of them must serve their community, and what better way to decide than by conducting a raffle (I knew I shouldn’t have bought two strips). The lights come up, and we slip back into the ridiculous façade of the autumn social, much to the relief of the audience. The last ticket to be drawn is the ticket of the damned. Stopped at the last second by Dion who has been seemingly absent for most of the social, he removes the Bull’s head and begins the last story of the night. As he recites the story in a hypnotic trance, he admits to spiking the characters with psychotropic drugs, inducing their hallucinations. It becomes apparent that Dion had not in fact been conducting the meetings of the Woodcraft Folk but had instead been conducting the meetings of a secret pagan cult. In a truly powerful ending, Dion’s symbolic suicide takes place. The audience sit for a while apparently confused by the contrast, but never-the-less commends the cast with raucous applause.

Although collectively a strong cast, Gwydion Rhys gives an outstanding performance as both Dion and Madam Isis. The piece was genuinely enjoyable and fantastically rich in myth, but I fear the twisted humour of the piece may have been slightly misunderstood by an older audience. The piece slips easily from the light-hearted, stereotypical Welsh community hall into the more serious dramatic action which has become an archetypal factor for the company: it just seems this was more confusing than engaging for some. How do I feel I can conclude this? As the community filed out of the hall, amongst other confused reactions, my favourite was definitely, “Well it was different. Peculiar, like. A bit like Midsomer Murders.” Despite several confused responses, I for one feel incredibly excited for future projects by the company. National Theatre Wales is truly taking a step into the future with innovative, affordable theatre.

1) Introduction: Welsh Theatre in Edinburgh.

There’s definitely a certain ignorance surrounding Theatre in Wales. Is the term ‘Welsh Theatre’ used specifically to define Welsh language theatre, or does it simply mean Theatre in Wales? I would prefer to argue the latter. Welsh theatre doesn’t necessarily need to be written in Welsh to evoke a Welsh sentiment. Some of Wales’ greatest writers wrote in English, albeit occasionally for the sometimes simple reason, they were unable to speak the Welsh tongue, arguably one of the greatest tragedies of modern Wales.  Dylan Thomas, Gwyn Thomas: These significant Welsh novelists and dramatists, who were so popular in their time, wrote in English, but more often than not, they wrote about Wales. As important as this is in the definition of Anglo-Welsh fiction, I believe this also to be an important defining factor of Welsh theatre. To truly evoke a Welsh feeling, it must at least be written about Wales. Glyn Jones, an Anglo-Welsh literature reviewer, believed that “the only English thing about an Anglo-Welsh writer ought to be his language”. For the sake of consistency, this must be true for Welsh Theatre too.

For people who believe Welsh Theatre to be on the decline, they might just be in for a shock. Ok, so when we think of Welsh Theatre, we might think of Gwenlyn Parri or Saunders Lewis perhaps, both exquisite Welsh language writing talents, but what of contemporary Welsh Theatre? For many, the Welsh presence at this year’s Edinburgh Fringe Festival eased these doubts. National Theatre Wales staged their highly successful production which consisted of a combination of Gwyn Thomas’ works, and Sherman Cymru took the lead for Welsh language theatre with their production of ‘Llwyth’ written by Dafydd James. I suppose the term ‘Renaissance’ is perhaps slightly melodramatic, but if the English had one, then surely we can too?

It certainly felt like a kind of renaissance for me as I have always been eager to combine my passion for Wales and Welshness with a love for theatre. Being lucky enough to purchase tickets for National Theatre Wales’ The Dark Philosophers in advance, I squeezed myself into one of the last remaining seats in the overwhelmingly packed Traverse Theatre in Edinburgh. Being already a massive fan of Gwyn Thomas, I was intrigued to see the translation of such a culturally rich novella, and was not disappointed with the theatre’s fantastic adaptation. A combination of three of Thomas’ works, the lights came up to reveal a quirky set, consisting of several different doors on different levels representing Thomas’ iconic terraced houses. Out of these doors, characters, or ‘elements’ as Thomas would have referred to them, would appear and disappear seamlessly. Thomas himself was considered to be the embodiment of the spirit of the valleys, often encapsulating this through his writing. The production therefore had a kind of duty to preserve this, to preserve such a feeling of Welshness. The show featured singing and mining, something Artistic Director John Mcgrath considered to be ‘Classically Welsh’ in the most respectful sense. There were fantastic performances from a solely Welsh cast, with most actors doubling up and displaying a variety of different skills. I’m not sure why, but Welsh accents really made a difference, and although added to the humour, did not detract from the more poignant scenes. Gwyn Thomas was cleverly represented as a character, following the other characters around the set, chipping in with witty additions in true Thomas style, and occasionally directing the characters onstage. Glyn Pritchard perfectly emulated Thomas in his speech and his way with flowing rhetoric, appearing onstage in the first scene, reassuring the audience in a thick Rhondda accent, “Don’t worry, I’m dead.” One of my biggest concerns was how the theatre would handle the representation of Oscar, the protagonist of the eponymous novella. Being rather a symbol of sexual and authoritarian oppression as opposed to an actual plausible character, Oscar is reminiscent of the big bad giant often featured in children’s fairytale stories. National Theatre Wales however, stepped up to this challenge and enlisted the help of a puppeteer. They created a grotesque representation of the capitalist oppressor onstage in a fantastically symbolic way. By doing so, they managed to preserve a primary message of the original text which simultaneously happened to be a particularly Welsh aspect of the text; Welsh oppression. Humour and poignancy were beautifully crafted into this powerful piece of theatre, and I’m glad to say that a feeling of pure Welshness ran through its veins.

Running across the road to St George’s West On my first day in Edinburgh, I hurriedly took my seat in the front row ready for Sherman Cymru’s production of Llwyth. Having gotten myself ridiculously lost on the way to the venue (I’d managed to misplace my map somewhere between the Royal Mile and the Castle) I had prepared myself to be sat in a relatively empty theatre, especially following the rather unenthusiastic responses from friends earlier in the day when I asked the question, “Who wants to come and see some Welsh language Theatre with me?”  Retrospectively, I probably should have mentioned the fact that it was subtitled, so being non-Welsh speakers, I can’t exactly blame them for their refusals. I was pleasantly surprised when I looked round to see a substantial audience, most of who it seemed, were reliant on the English subtitles.  Described as a ‘flamboyant fantasia on gay identity and Welshness', Llwyth was so stylistically Welsh. I’ve been trying to think about what I mean by this statement for a while, and the best way I can think to explain it, is that the production just felt Welsh. The monologues flowing seamlessly into dialogue between characters, the perfect combination of humor and poignancy: it had the structure of the classic Welsh dramas.  It was something I would have studied in school, but it was also something exciting and new; something which combined the old Wales with the new. The language ‘barrier’ didn’t seem to be an issue, and it was refreshing to see a representation of current South Walian dialect. For want of a better phrase, it was beautifully written in Wenglish.  It’s impossible to select specific scenes from the play that really stood out, because together they all perfectly created the complex plot. The performances strayed away from often portrayed stereotypes and were performed with tact and humility. Simon Watts as the aptly named protagonist Aneurin gave a phenomenal performance. A lyrical poet, a Welsh hating Welshman, a character generally full of angst, Aneurin breaks down as the play reaches its climactic point after Aneurin has managed to isolate himself through his tyrannical behavior. In the play’s perhaps most poignant scene, he reveals the reason behind it all (which I will refrain from announcing here, as it may spoil it for some). Aneurin as this combination of the old and the new, a gay Welsh poet,, was what the play was all about: the combination of the old and new Wales. The play is significantly Welsh, but its issues are universal. It just felt wonderful to be able to watch something like this through our own language, but to also know that it reached a bigger audience.

I can honestly say that after a week in Edinburgh, countless fantastic shows, these two Welsh productions were my highlight. Ok, so maybe I'm biased, but it's true. Perhaps the future for Welsh theatre isn’t looking so bleak after all. If it can impassion one young Welsh Theatre lover, then I have no doubt this can spread to a far bigger audience. It has to; I need to make a career out of it.