Dundee was at the heart of the jute industry for nearly 200 years; everyone in Dundee knows someone - was probably related to someone - who worked in the jute mills. Regionalised theatre often contents itself with geographical name-dropping to win over the local audience, but musical comedy, The Mill Lavvies, goes far beyond that. It is intimately concerned with the lives of the people for whom it was created.
Skiving in the gents of a jute mill one day in the early 1960s, the characters banter and fight like wizened schoolboys. Archie, an adorable old halfwit played with tremendous compassion and humour by John Buick, bounds around like an elderly kangaroo, perpetually sweeping with his beloved brush. It is pinched by nasty Henny (Rodney Matthew), but Kevin, a "good wee laddie", helps him get it back. As befits his status as the nice one, Kevin (Andrew Clark), who moons around dreaming of buying a bass like Paul McCartney's, has the climactic accident.
This is knockabout stuff, but the cartoonishness is built into the foundations of the characters. The performances are certainly larger than life, but they are never indulgent. And director Hamish Glen shrewdly draws on the cast's natural charm without ever allowing them to sink into mawkishness. Though singing may not be the actors' strong point, they manage to carry off Michael Marra's remarkably silly songs, with titles such as If Dundee was Africa, through sheer force of personality.
The extraordinary warmheartedness of The Mill Lavvies, though in most ways a winning factor, unfortunately also proves to be the only chink in its armour. Even he heartless boss, Thornton, shows himself to be human in the end when he sends the workers home early. Surely the exploitation of these semi-literate workers by such bosses merits an angrier denunciation of the system?
As it is, the only discussion of the political realities of their situation - in this case, the possibility of unionisation - lasts less than a minute. The characters would be better served if the audience, at least, were allowed to see the wider picture.
· Until November 27. Box office: 01382 223530
