An old man clutches his alarm clock, bleary eyes counting the seconds. An old woman gazes at a row of perfect porcelain knick-knacks, smiling, polishing them adoringly. The seconds tick by. All that can break the silence now is the ‘chit chat chit chat’ of the mundane, of memories long ago, of the terrifying, yet comfortable present. They know that with the talking will come darkness, stories never quite forgotten, joyous and chilling. Irish-born playwright Enda Walsh’s The Small Things, is a testament to the simple act of speech, and how words sustain us.

Directed by Sarah Goodes, this Australian production from the writer who brought us the cult-hit Disco Pigs, is beautifully and quietly realised within the intimate Belvoir Downstairs Theatre. Designed by Karla Urizar, we are allowed into what at first glance seems a crumbling, yet invitingly warm living room. The walls needs plastering, the parquet floors need mending, and a man (Ralph Cotterill) and woman (Annie Byron) sit as if ornaments in the scene, collecting dust and slowly ageing. They begin their idle ‘chit chat’. The man reminisces about being an inquisitive six-year old with an eye for engineering and his mother’s bountiful breasts. The woman recalls the regimented childhood she lived at the hands of her maniacal father. Both fantasised about the freedom of outdoors as children, however seem now to be bound by their armchairs and simply gaze out the window. Although their stories intertwine, they are in fact in separate houses on facing mountain-tops, and knew each other as children. They do not know each other today and we do not know if they are actually the last people on earth, yet they will share some fond, hilarious and eventually haunting stories with us as audience.

Walsh’s strength is his language, undoubtedly. To write such a play that demands poetical storytelling for 90 minutes straight, one must have skill. And he does. Walsh’s words lull us with their delicate poetry, poignant and humorous – even the characters stop to note certain fantastic words such as ‘languid.’ The stories are dripping with words and images that simply out a smile on one’s face, like the man’s frequent mentioning of meringues and the chips drowned in brown sauce that felt like slugs in the mouth. Although this play does not rest on the laurels of its vocabulary – Cotterill and Byron deliver stunning performances to enliven the words from the page.

The sheer facial expressions of Cotterill as the Man are enough to sustain a role that affords him minimal movement. We see the trappings and frustrations of age take hold in him, and yet he is able to embody his six-year-old self with exuberance and childlike delight. Byron as the Woman has all the sweetness and naievity of her child self, and moves her audience with fluctuations between bitterness, contentment and helplessness against memories that will not fade. As the warm and familiar exposition slowly progresses, Walsh’s play descends into frightening, almost surreal and definitely unexpected territory. The story that will link them irrevocably certainly adds dramatic interest, however because the play relies on 90 minutes of monologues with a lack of any dramatic action, one’s attention does become strained.

The Small Things is a beautiful play that bridges the gap between sentimentality and horror. It’s quirky, absurd, familiar and somehow distant. It should probably be half an hour shorter, however the language itself and the brilliant performances are enough to make this a truly beguiling piece of theatre.