Review by Rohan Alston-Fisher
A show based on nothing, dwells on everything
Mill Theatre Co-Production Series
Mill Theatre at Dairy Road
Love, pain, growing up. We’ve all been there (well, some of us might still be there), and Thom Pain (based on nothing) at The Mill Theatre manages to touch on it in a thought-provoking way. Written by Will Eno and directed by Maddie Lee, it’s a darkly comedic monodrama that follows Thom Pain’s (Joey Minogue) loose ramblings through stories and experiences, both happy and disheartening. He jumps between them, from stories of mistaking hostile bees as helpful, to his first time falling in love. Like the name might suggest, the show is an ungrounded jumble of half-finished thoughts told from the perspective of Thom. Eventually, as loose threads of stories grow more and more numerous, the show reaches its climax and abrupt ending; from Thom yelling at the top of his lungs to total blackout and silence – making for an entertaining conclusion.
The play is in quite a different context from when it originally debuted 2004. In particular, the way the show talks about loneliness and isolation hits a lot harder in the current world we find ourselves in – one with social media causing a “loneliness epidemic”. Lee does a good job of highlighting parts of the show like these using the lighting and sound design. The production itself normally has a silent soundtrack and a simple spotlight that occasionally moves to be pointing at Thom, so when unsettling piano music plays or the stage is washed in blue light, it really makes moments stand out as important.
The show makes a point of drawing attention to how dark its comedy can be: a dramatic and depressing monologue, followed by a quick-witted comment that really had me wondering whether I should be laughing at the remark. This kind of self-awareness is what made Thom Pain stand out to me over other dramas that discuss existential topics (take Beckett’s Waiting for Godot as example), because it presents a contrast to the usual conclusion of these plays. Usually in such a play, it will leave us with a morose and dismal message that laments on the futility of life and the human condition. Instead, Thom Pain does something quite unusual. Thom takes his stories of hardship and still forms a bright conclusion – that life is beautiful, even if not every moment is.
From start to finish, this work requires a performer with strong energy, and Monigue does not fail to deliver with contagious enthusiasm for the role. He leaps between a screaming mess of a person to a slightly nervous magician in quite an impressive way. One of the taglines I saw in a display cabinet at The Mill’s foyer sums up how I feel about Minogue’s Thom nicely: “He’s just like you… except worse.” Minogue presents Thom as a person of extremes; demonstrating the highs and lows of feelings that we all sometimes have. This works well with the writing and gives the performance the quick pacing that made it just so entertaining to watch.
Thom Pain is a rewarding evening of theatre, and this production finds something unexpectedly open-ended in Will Eno’s bleak material that speaks to the care and intelligence the team has brought to it.
