Review: Louis Viljoen’s The Sin Drinkers, beguiling drama, in a gloaming glare of closure

Louis Viljoen’s new play, The Sin Drinkers is a darkly beguiling drama, with two individuals, cloaked in a gloaming glare of the attempt for closure. It is riveting theatre – a brilliant new work from Viljoen, the maestro of the grizzly and uncomfortable and how we connect and more often disconnect in relationships. In The Sin Drinkers, Frank (John Maytham) ferrets out Theresa (Emma Kotze) who was his daughter’s best friend. The past lingers with unanswered questions and answers. Frank and Theresa face off each other, with tots of whisky to loosen their tongues, in a fugue of regret and confession. They meet in a gloaming space of desire – to reach a reclamation and redemption of sorts- through the night and its terrors.

The Sin Drinkers is signature Louis Viljoen with raw unvarnished dialogue, cleaved with intimacy, looping around itself. People tend to speak across each other and Viljoen is a maestro at evoking the cadence of conversation. However in some of his previous plays, I have sometimes found the pace challenging with people yapping over each other. In The Sin Drinkers, there is the signature Viljoen overlaying but it tempered as the protagonists wait to slug down another shot. They take measure of each other, before punching out the next devastating shot. This enables one to digest the brilliant script – tragic, comedic, poetic and lyrical. I was holding onto each utterance from Frank and Emma as their stories are slashed out on stage. I won’t plot spoil. It is a heart breaking story of regret and could-have, should-have refrains.

Frank and Theresa meet in the gloaming: Good in the light; bad in the dark? Who knows? Perhaps it is what lies between which opens up the possibility of tossing off lies and illusions: The best time to think or drink? It is “either too late or not late enough”. Viljoen’s writing is urgent, reeking with pain in this intensely beautiful play of two damaged people, yearning to be set free from their demons, through booze and whatever it takes. In the simmering quarry of inebriation, they trade accusations and insults, the deeds of mothers and fathers and miserable families.

What juncture do these unlikely drinking buddies arrive at? We are here – in life – we make decisions to be present – and there is closure in this drama. I won’t plot spoil. The design by Kieran McGregor cloaks the scene of the sin drinkers in the gloaming glare of disclosure, with a reveal which is shocking but conjured up by light, sound and suggestion, rather than graphic portrayal. Coupled with the stylishly kitted out protagonists in black and white, superb performances by Maytham and Kotze and the tight direction by Viljoen, The Sin Drinkers is a must see. It is a poignant cautionary tale: It is never too late – to be present and accountable. Who is to say what is what in this morality tale, where everyone was tragically out of synch. But, we lurch on as we must, seeking to understand the unfathomable. I loved The Sin Drinkers – superb script, performances, direction and design.

✳ Emma Kotze and John Maytham in The Sin Drinkers, written and directed by Louis Viljoen, The Baxter’s Masambe Theatre, April 23 to May 11, 2024. Pic: Barbara Loots.