Michael Sheen Brings Warmth and Wit to a Welsh-Set Our Town Revival
Thornton Wilder's classic American play Our Town has been transposed to Wales for the inaugural production of the new National Theatre Wales, with Michael Sheen taking centre stage in a heartfelt revival that blends mischief with earnestness. While the emotional bite of the original can feel uncertain at times, this Welsh interpretation captures the lyrical spirit of community life, love, and death with a playful and noisy energy that distinguishes it from its 1938 predecessor.
A Convincing Transposition with Welsh Flair
At first glance, shifting Wilder's great American play about a provincial town north of New York to Wales might seem counterintuitive, especially given the potential state-of-the-nation resonances in today's political climate. However, Our Town is more eternal than political, dramatising the universal experiences of a close-knit community. This production, championed by Sheen, convincingly encapsulates Welshness through its lilt, visual imagination, and movement design by Jess Williams, complemented by Ryan Joseph Stafford's emotional lighting.
The drama unfolds in three acts, with Sheen playing the "stage manager" who guides the audience through the story. Dressed in a waistcoat and watch-chain, Sheen is in his element, mixing mischievousness, earnestness, and bathos as he narrates, ruminates, and even steps into various characters. The play begins on a morning in 1901, showing the budding romance between young George Gibbs, played by Peter Devlin, and Emily Webb, portrayed by Yasemin Özdemir. It then leaps to their marriage three years later and finally to the town's cemetery in 1913, exploring themes of untimely death.
Abundant Physicality and Magical Moments
Hayley Grindle's set design traditionally keeps the stage empty, relying on the stage manager's descriptions to engage the audience's imagination. Props are used with economy, such as wooden planks that form the town's edifice and are reused in expressionist ways. This approach allows for abundant physicality, with some moments sparking with magic, creating a handsome production overall.
Despite its Welsh spirit and look—featuring period costumes, Welsh accents, and names—the production retains American reference points, including mentions of Republicans, New Hampshire, the American Constitution, the Louisiana Purchase, and high school. This lends an unreal quality, unhinged from its original geography yet still locked into it, leaving viewers to wonder if the azure sky backdrop belongs to Welsh valleys or American mountains. As a result, one might yearn for "more" Welshness in its fibre.
Directed with Romance and Nostalgia
Directed by Francesca Goodridge, with Russell T Davies as creative associate, this version of Grover's Corner evokes the romance and nostalgia of a bygone community, reminiscent of Dylan Thomas's fishing village in Under Milk Wood—a play Sheen previously starred in at the National Theatre. However, the first two acts lack Thomas's deft play of darkness and light, leaning too heavily into warmth and light without enough tension or conflict, making the community feel akin to The Waltons in south Wales until the final, shortest act.
When darkness does arrive, it brings a ghostly scene reminiscent of A Christmas Carol, where the dead speak like Greek gods, impervious to human vulnerability. This interpretation is interesting but emotionally distancing. The production also highlights the town's ordinariness through a fantastically deft piece of mime involving the town drunk, Simon, played by Rhys Warrington, insinuating him as a closeted gay man trapped by small-town mores.
A Moral Lesson on Relishing Life
Grover's Corner is portrayed as a nice town where no one remarkable ever emerged, suggesting it throttles anything out of the ordinary. Yet, its "ordinariness" carries a moral lesson: to relish the gloriously quotidian moments in life. Sentimental like a version of It's a Wonderful Life, but without the ecstatic uplift, the narrator reflects, "You're 21, you're 22, and whack, you're 70." The message is finger-wagging but effective, urging audiences to look up and drink in ordinary life because it passes too quickly.
This production of Our Town runs until 31 January at the Swansea Grand before touring, offering a unique Welsh twist on a timeless classic that blends heartfelt storytelling with theatrical innovation.
