19/08/26

Summerhall (Red Lecture Theatre), Edinburgh

On a stage littered with autumn leaves, the Storyteller (Rebecca Camilleri) begins a whimsical, rhyming fairytale about a doomed bell hanger called Magnus Coffinkey (Jospeh Zammit). In the middle of the night, high up in a belfry, Coffinkey is spooked, first by a malevolent gargoyle and then by a cauldron of bats. As he falls, he grabs the bell – which proves a near-fatal error. He and it tumble together, the silver bell entombing him in the graveyard.

When Magnus wakes up, it’s to find a sweet, guileless creature stealing his heart. From her, he learns that he is in The Gloom, a space somewhere between life and death. If he wants to return to the world he knows, he’ll need Harmony’s help to mend his broken ticker…

So far, so twee – but there is more to this dark fable than meets the eye. Zammit imbues Magnus with real sorrow, while Camilleri perfectly inhabits a whole host of roles, most heartbreakingly that of Harmony. The piece is, in fact, an ode to grief, Magnus’s story serving as catharsis for Lara (Camilleri), a writer trying to cope with immense loss. Cleverly, despite the allegorical structure, there are no glib answers offered here. In fact, when Lara’s husband, Jeremy (Zammit), attempts to provide the ending Lara’s struggling with she dismisses his maxims as useless platitudes.

Something deeper is required…

Co-written by husband and wife team, Malcolm and Angele Galea of Malta’s Give or Take Productions, this play is at once profound and beautiful, precise and dynamic; the script perfectly complemented by Philip Leone-Ganado’s sure-footed direction. Sam Edmunds’ imaginative use of simple lighting – a bell gobo; a couple of coloured bars; a few overhead lamps – provides the finishing touches, establishing whether we’re in Magnus’s story or Lara’s reality.

Only the most stone-hearted person could fail to cry at this play – but only the most cynical could fail to smile.

4.3 stars

Susan Singfield