BWW Reviews: THE PITMEN PAINTERS Highlights Class Struggle and Art Now Thru Feb. 12th

From deep within the coalmines of England’s 1930’s Northumberland town of Ashington, playwright Lee Hall crafts another play about class struggle, art and transformation.  Almost a prequel to the coalmining story that he brought to life in his Tony-award winning Billy Elliot, The Pitmen Painters tells the true-life story of coalminers, “pitmen,” who are transformed by a Worker’s Education Association (WEA) art appreciation class.  As a group they became renowned throughout England for their “working-class” art.  Heartfelt, honest and peppered with humor, the TheatreWorks premiere of The Pitmen Painters raises as many questions as it answers about class-struggle and the meaning of art and, by the end, leaves you with a desire to pick up a paintbrush yourself.

“The point of a painting is how it makes you feel,” says a frustrated Mr. Lyon (the spot on Paul Whitworth) when asked by his students to tell them the secret of understanding paintings.  He’s been hired by the WEA to teach art appreciation to this group of undereducated miners and quickly finds that they have never actually seen any art.  In a moment of inspiration he decides that he will have them learn by doing.  He begins by assigning them various subjects to paint and the men come back each week with paintings that the whole class critiques.  In the ensuing analysis questions bubble up about class, socialism, what art is and whether or not just anyone can paint.

The group is held together by union rep George Brown (James Carpenter) who stridently follows the rules set for him by the WEA.  “We set very high standards – we are pitmen,” he says with pride and not a little judgment, to Mr. Lyons, who has come in late the first day of class.  Other classmates include Jimmy (a spunky Jackson Davis), Harry Wilson (Dan Hiatt) who finds Marxist themes in every piece of work, the young lad (played by Nicholas Pelczar) and Oliver Kilbourn, played by the remarkable Patrick Jones. 

It is Kilbourn who must ultimately decide whether to stay with the group or take up heiress Helen Sutherland’s offer to leave the pit and paint for a living instead.  Marcia Pizzo’s Sutherland is sophisticated without being overly stuffy and gives subtle signs that she might be more interested in the painter than in his work.  Jones quietly displays the tension that his character is feeling – the need to remain loyal to his mates and the desire to escape the pitmen’s grueling life.  Hall uses this tension to highlight class struggle and issues of loyalty to great effect.

Top-notch acting by the entire ensemble adds depth to the story, which at times lacks punch, the driving plotline being the slow transformation of the miners over several decades. Leslie Martinson’s smart direction carries the story along though, sharply delineating each character, yet maintaining the focus on the group as a whole.  They were, after all, known as the Ashington Group and achieved their fame as such.

Scenes as disparate as Sutherland’s mansion, a train station and a London museum all take place in scenic designer Andrea Bechert’s “hut,” the place where the pitmen painters met before, during and after WWII.   The changes in location could have been made clearer with the lighting design but wonderful projections by Jim Gross do the job quite nicely. 

Place and the passing of time are splashed onto a series of hanging screens provided by Bechert. The dismal coal mines, dour Ashington row houses, and London Charing Cross railway station give us the setting, but it is the art of the Pitmen painters that comes to life in the projections, easily making playwright Hall’s case for the need for art in the lives of all, no matter their station in life. 

The women’s period costumes (by B. Modern) are evocative of the times, but it would have been helpful to see the miners in their work clothes at least once.  It seems doubtful that they all could have owned suits to wear to class each week.  Also questionable are their erudite, discursive critiques – quite remarkable for men who have been working in the mines since the age of ten or so, with little or no education. These things aside, The Pitmen Painters is a story for our times, given the class struggles taking place in our own country.  And it may move you to take an art appreciation class yourself and seek your own transformation through art.

----

The Pitmen Painters

A Comic Drama by Lee Hall

Two hours, 20 minutes

TheatreWorks – www.theatreworks.org

Photo courtesy of Tracy Martin

To post a comment, you must register and login.