Actor makes things look easy in one-man show ‘Thom Pain’

I hesitate to call Shane Cullum's performance in the one-person Las Vegas Little Theatre studio show "Thom Pain (based on nothing)" great, not because it isn't, but because the word may be misleading.

Cullum isn't an actor who goes in much for flash. He doesn't call attention to the hard work he's doing to quietly slip into a character's skin. If you've never seen him perform, you may assume that whatever personality he's creating is similar to the actor's. He makes it look so easy. But you're made more aware of his skill when you see him in multiple productions. There are so many sides to the man that you wonder how one person can know so much about so many different kinds of people.

Will Eno's monologue (a 2005 Pulitzer Prize finalist) is a beautifully rambling dissertation about purpose, disappointment and reality. Cullum plays an amusingly angry Everyman who's trying to come to terms with his life, and ours. He often drifts in and out of subjects. Some seemingly random thoughts -- such as a story about an unfortunate boy -- keep returning and actually begin to make sense as the 70-minute evening flies by. Sample gems: "I strike myself as a person who just left." Regarding childhood emotional traumas: "Isn't it a wonder how we never recover?" On immortality: "Someday, some minute, you'll have 30 seconds to live."

For all the show's humor, it's amazing how much you actually feel for this guy. Cullum doesn't go for the easy laugh. The yuks come from character, and the actor doesn't seem aware of how funny he's being.

Director Troy Heard magnificently shapes Cullum's work. He sees to it that the blocking on the tiny stage feels varied and gets a surprising amount of vocal variety from the actor. The two seem to understand each other's strengths. You couldn't ask for a more professionally compatible team.

This is an experience that starts out slight and then explodes with power. Heard and Cullum have gotten at not just the show's heart, but its brain. It's a little Will Rogers, Woody Allen, Freud, Nietzsche and who knows who else. I felt as if I were attending an exciting dinner party.

Anthony Del Valle can be reached at vegastheaterchat @aol.com. You can write him c/o Las Vegas Review-Journal, P.O. Box 70, Las Vegas, NV 89125.