Sunday 30 May 2021

THEATRE REVIEW: The Merthyr Stigmatist - The Sherman Theatre, Cardiff. (online)


Produced by The Sherman Theatre, Cardiff, and Theatre Uncut, this is the latest play from the pen of Lisa Parry. Performed on the Sherman Theatre's stage, the production has been filmed and is available to watch online for a limited period.

Directed by Emma Callander, the play is a two-hander and looks at the unlikely relationship, and even more unlikely circumstance of a 16 -ear-old Catholic schoolgirl who claims to receive a stigmata every Friday, and her teacher who deliberately connives to keep her isolated and in detention one Friday after school in order to confront her about it.

Both actresses - Bethan McLean as the hard-nut cocky Carys, and Bethan Mary-James as the new teacher in town Sian, returning to her roots and not at all happy, or convinced, about Carys's claims - play their respective roles with earnestness and passion. However, there is something missing in this production. I have to be honest, and say that I can't quite put my finger on exactly what it is; other than to say all the parts didn't exactly completely cohere, and I had the distinct impression of being an outsider looking in and not understanding. Obviously the medium in which I watched this play didn't help. No mater how visceral a production is, a computer screen and lack of live atmosphere denudes the experience dramatically; but there was something more than just that with this play: it felt "acted", "staged", which of course it was.. but the whole point is that we believe and "buy-in" to the acting: something I was struggling to do.

Perhaps one thing which didn't help me "believe" was the set, designed by Elin Steele, and the continuous use of steel lighting. (some straws at some point would have been welcomed). It was somehow futuristic, straight out of a Sci-Fi film. It looked nothing like any school classroom I have ever seen in my life, and failed to set the scene and mood.

One of the more significant parts of the storyline involved the fact that Sian, the teacher, had originally come from Merthyr and moved to Cardiff, only three months' ago securing a job in her home town again. Carys tells her teacher off for using a "fake Cardiff accent", and yet I was struggling to detect any kind of a Welsh accent at all from Mary-James. Pitted against the melodious and unmistakably Welsh sing-songy voice of McLean, Mary-James's accent was bland, English, and even London at times.

The play raises various issues: religion and religious belief, child protection, the legal system, the school system, mental health, the care system: in fact, within this less-than-one-hour play, there is an awful lot to take in. Is the child really experiencing the stigmata? She uploads a video on her social network to prove it, and her popularity and fame soar exponentially. Is that why she was "lying"? Was she lying? And why did her teacher lock the door to her classroom and refuse to let her student go?

Perhaps the play raises more questions that it could possibly answer in its running time, and the ending was also quite bizarre in my opinion: again, it felt like the writer needed to do something to sensationalise the play, to make it memorable, rather than let the subject matter speak for itself. 

An interesting, but sadly unsatisfying watch.

Reviewer - Matthew Dougall
on - 29.5.21 


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