En la Ardiente Oscuridad
★★★★☆ Intriguing
Bedlam Theatre: Wed 6 – Fri 8 May 2026
Review by Hugh Simpson
En la Ardiente Oscuridad (In the Burning Darkness), from the Edinburgh University Spanish Society at the Bedlam, is a thoughtful and thought-provoking production featuring noteworthy performances.
Antonio Buero Vallejo’s 1950 play, performed here in Spanish with English surtitles, used the setting of a college for young blind people to critique the postwar Franco regime in a way subtle enough to get past the censors.
In the college, the students have had things arranged so they know where everything is and are happy enough with the ‘will of steel’ the institution encourages. A new arrival named Ignacio, however, refuses to give up his cane and criticises the others for their acceptance of conditions – something which causes problems for the status quo.
Noah Sarvesvaran, Charles Birchler and Rory Kind. Pic: EUSpSoc
There’s certainly something intriguing about the situation, and the symbolism of the piece marks it out as very different from any English-language plays of the period. While Spanish speakers may have a fuller idea of how some aspects of the play are performed, the dialogue has a flow and impact.
The surtitles, despite being projected on to a rather crumpled cloth, are easy to follow and responsive to the performance. The translation has that familiar yet always odd combination of slang and over-literary language, but this soon stops being a problem. On a couple of occasions more thought needed to be given to the placing of actors in order to let all of the audience read them, but this was rare.
Sam Gearing’s direction is carefully considered throughout, with a delicate balance struck between realism and symbolism. Apart from an ill-advised foray into the gallery at the start of the second half, the acting space is used with care, with the lighting design of Kjari Maher Ragnars being striking. Overall, there is a rhythm to the performance that is extremely praiseworthy.
walk a difficult line expertly
That combination of the realistic and non-realistic is crystallised in the important confrontation near the play’s climax between Ignacio and Carlos, a student who represents conformity to the institute. Charles Birchler (Ignacio) and Noah Sarvesvaran (Carlos) walk a difficult line expertly, hinting at the symbolic impact of the dialogue without succumbing to portentousness.
Birchler’s Ignacio has a suitably otherworldly tinge to the character’s suffering, while Sarvesvaran’s performance is full of depth, hinting at the nagging doubts beneath the character’s apparent satisfaction.
Freya Doyle and Rachel McLaren in En La Ardiente Oscuridad. Pic: EUSpSoc.
Freya Doyle is Juana, Carlos’s girlfriend who feels sympathy for Ignacio. In this case the character’s symbolic importance tends to outweigh its realism, but Doyle plays her with considerable delicacy.
Rory Kind gives Miguel, the college’s resident joker, a similar credibility, while Rachel McLaren is thoroughly believable as Elisa, who feels slighted when Miguel starts enjoying listening to Ignacio rather than hanging out with her.
Leonardo Moretti-Rando has a presence as the college’s director Don Pablo, while Roni Kane is authoritative and wonderfully controlled as his wife Doña Pepita. Lauryn McGuire, Hattie Foden Ellis and Danny Mulligan, as other students, are also impressive.
texture
The fact that such characters exist, when they have little impact on driving the narrative, does give the play texture but also marks it out as belonging to another era, when larger companies were the norm in professional theatre.
Of course, there is something else which dates it, which is the whole notion of blindness as a metaphor. While it is a common theatrical trope, it would surely be thought of in a different way by a playwright now.
In particular, the idea of the students taking control of their situation, and talking about ‘seers’ and ‘non-seers’, will strike many contemporary audiences as wholly positive, rather than as being suitable to be used as reflecting a submission to fascism.
Which is a pity, as the play is a far more subtle affair than might be expected. Taken on its own terms, it has considerable power, and is done justice here by a production which is acted with real drive.
Running time: One hours 50 minutes including one interval
Bedlam Theatre, 11B Bristo Place, EH1 1EZ
Wednesday 6 – Friday 8 May 2026
Daily at 7.30 pm
Details: https://bedlamtheatre.co.uk
Tickets: Book here.
Rory Kind, Charles Birchler and Lauryn McGuire. Pic: EUSpSoc.
ENDS
