Doubting Thomas

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You could pack out a theatre audience with the people who get beaten up, smashed, or thrown off bridges in Doubting Thomas. It's the work of eight ex-offenders involved with social enterprise Grassmarket Projects, who tell the true story of a hugely violent Edinburgh mafia enforcer.

A series of scenes flip back and forth between the surging violence and high drama of the past, and Thomas' more measured present where he works mentoring young offenders. Director Jeremy Weller appears in the piece, too, encouraging Thomas to write, but his impartial, theatrical approach to the story's violent incidents spurs Thomas to take him on a terrifying car ride that shows him what fear is really like. 

Thomas' central philosophy is that once you've been in real, gut-wrenching terror, you never forget it. And you're spurred to give other people that same feeling. He talks of a loveless childhood that left him incapable of empathising with other people. There are pacy scenes of hilarious camaraderie and banter between Thomas' mafia crew, spun in rough Edinburgh slang. But there's little love behind their knockabout jokes; their bonds are weak, and broken in a moment.

Thomas' betrayal by his friends gives him eight years in prison: it gives him time to develop a philosophy about the masks that violent offenders wear, as they feign a hardness they don't feel. This play tears off those masks, with the unflinching honesty of its performances showing us men who are as vulnerable as they are violent.