Under Milk Wood
Director: Rosalba Clemente
Adelaide Centre for the Arts
Sat 9 Dec
Season closed



There is no better welcome for an audience than the tantalising promise, "From where you are, you can hear their dreams." First Voice Eugene Raggio masters the thick Welsh accent required to bring Dylan Thomas' poetically descriptive language to life.

A community atmosphere of mingling characters was established immediately with Casey Van Sebille's clever staging: two rows of chairs facing each other like terraced houses across a street, with the backcloth and floor showing pastel images of the fishing town of Llareggub. Actors standing behind the gauze backdrop were lit up to portray the nagging voices of remembered gossips, or the demanding babble of dead sailors in Captain Cat's dreams. This worked sometimes for tragic effect, with dead Rosie Probert fading from memory, and sometimes for comic value, as when Dai Bread was seen through a crystal ball undressing for one of his two wives.

The versatile performers took on many roles through quick costume changes. Choral speech gave the impression of children, animals and scolding voices gossiping. The postman steaming open the mail ensures that nobody in the community has secrets. The enthusiastic passion of Mog Edwards (Ezra Juanta) and Myfanwy Price (Tomoko Nishizawa) was well conveyed through their body language and facial expressions, although their diction could have been clearer.

Director Rosalba Clemente employed elements of physical theatre: torches illuminated sleepers, suggested an owl's flight, then were clasped like flickering candles to suggest prayer during the vicar's morning poem. The humming of a traditional Welsh song in harmony enhanced this magical moment.

There were many rapid sequences where bodies transformed in quick succession from babies and old men to doors and boats, cows and goats. These moments were contrasted with calm stillness, as when everybody but the First Voice received a marshmallow and sat stolidly chewing in silence.

Some accents slipped, and the performers at times spoke too quickly and indistinctly, losing the lines' humour. Surprisingly, the production closed with the baffling song choice of Men Of Harlech sung in English, its warlike sentiments at odds with the prevailing mellow mood of the production. However, the talented graduating actors performed with enjoyment and energy, and Adelaide can hope to see more from them in future.

Rosie Clarke