The Wages of Thin

Synopsis

Alfred Rimbaud Thin goes to relieve himself in a public convenience only to find himself a suspect in a murder enquiry. Over the course of a brutal interrogation, two bizarre policemen viciously accuse Thin of perversion, incest, and earning a wage that just doesn’t add up... Oscar-nominated for REDS and the recipient of major international awards for Comedians, Trevor Griffiths is one of our great contemporary dramatists. Written in 1969, The Wages of Thin was his extraordinary debut play about the fragility of personal privacy. Smouldering, fast and riddled with vicious humour, its resonances for today are terrifying and unmistakable.

Our Review:

Theo Bosanquet - 30 April 2010

In 1969, six years before Comedians brought him international acclaim, Trevor Griffiths wrote this one act black comedy, which sat gathering dust in a filing cabinet for over 30 years before it was published by his wife in a recent anthology of his plays.

Set in a public toilet, it centres on Alfred Rimbaud Thin, a white collar worker who finds himself accosted by two violent and shady 'detectives'. Telling him he's being questioned in relation to a murder case (the dead body happens to be in one of the cubicles), they proceed to press this ordinary man into laying bare his private life, most notably the fact that he's gay.

Written in the wake of the 1967 Sexual Offences Act, which decriminalised homosexuality, it ruminates on the issue of sexual privacy, and feels remarkably contemporary in its humour and tone.

Like Goldberg and McCann in The Birthday Party, the identity of the inquisitors  (known simply as Number One and Number Two) rem...

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Latest User Review

Emily W - 4 May 2010:

I loved this play! Wasn't what I expected at all - I live nearby and was at a loose end on Sunday, so went to see this. It was short and very sharp - the language was incredible and the cast did an amazing job keeping the pace, acuteness and - most surprisingly - the wit of the word play alive. I think everyone should see theatre like this - and wish I'd not wasted time of so many bad productions on the West End in the past when there are great hidden-gems like this around...

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