THEATRE: Guy Willoughby
THERE’S a certain sly satiric purpose behind Dylan Thomas’ poetic drama Under Milk Wood (first produced 1953); like the similarly folksy tales of Herman Charles Bosman, which date from the same period, Thomas’ detailed recreation of a little seaside village, Llaregyb, was not intended as soppy pastoral. There are all kinds of dark subterranean currents at work, some of which break the surface in Keith Grenville’s accomplished production of this famous “play of voices”, at the Baxter Studio in Cape Town.
After all, if you spell Llaregyb backwards, you get … Bygerall. This country backwater is hardly Eden, you understand.
The chief appeal of Under Milk Wood, of course, lies in its language — the rich, lyrical and simile-spattered speech that Thomas, the foremost Welsh poet of his generation, puts into the mouths of his characters. The play was originally written for radio; like oratorio as opposed to opera, voice and not action is the vehicle of the drama. (This is why the 1971 film version, starring Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, fell rather flat.)
This vocal concentration places great demands on the actors. There are also over 40 characters in the play; in this production a few more performers on stage would help the audience distinguish them all. Nevertheless, Grenville is in general well served by the four actors he has on stage.
The First Voice is taken by David Muller, and, while he has a pleasant enough timbre, one might have hoped for a more authoritative vocal stamp on the proceedings.
The First Voice is both narrator and guide through the 24 hours described by the play; he must set the tone, one that is quietly reflective, but astute and penetrating too. Muller does not quite manage to suggest this cooler perspective on the events described. His narrator seems chiefly interested in rural charm, not repressed desire, in the buried lives he resuscitates.
There is some finely varied and lively playing from the other actors. Brenda Cooper manages both jejune excitement and prune-lipped bitterness; her Mrs Ogmore- Pritchard, obsessively hygienic wife of two long-buried husbands, is wonderfully sour. As the vixenish Mrs Pugh she is a slyly comic study in grimmest prudery.
By contrast, Bianca Amato brings youthful ardour and a bell-like soprano to the part of Polly Garter, the village strumpet who confounds the withered morality of Llaregyb: although all her trysts are out of wedlock, she is the only character we meet profusely blessed with children. Polly confounds the jealous machinations of the “respectable” women — and figures large in the sad, spent dreams of their crushed menfolk.
David Crichton and David Alcock (is this a sly Welsh joke, that all the male actors on this stage are called “David”?) are both excellently cast: the springy pace of this production is largely due to them. Crichton’s impish brio serves him well in a variety of parts, including Willy Nilly, the gossipy, excitable postman, and the fanatical musician, Organ Morgan.
Alcock seems to have the pick of the parts. He is moving as blind Captain Cat, reliving his swashbuckling past; funny as the ghost of poor henpecked Mr Pritchard; and as the Reverent Eli Jenkins, he recites with droll solemnity a sentimental ode to Llaregyb (which is what most people think Under Milk Wood is too).
Alcock’s piece de resistance, however, is as Mr Pugh — ultimately repressed husband, and a man who spends every waking hour planning to murder his wife. Alcock brings a bright, clear vocality and a dynamic facial expressiveness to all these parts: he sets the standard for the others on stage to follow.