Journeymen Theater has never been a company to shy away from plays involving heavy themes or brimming with moral dilemmas. The group stays true to form with its ambitious production of After Darwin, now being staged at Church Street Theater.

After Darwin is a work where the play within a play is as fascinating, or even more so, as the action going on behind the scenes. A ragtag group of performers is staging a work centering around Charles Darwin’s voyage aboard the H.M.S. Beagle, during which Darwin conducted the surveys that would form the basis of The Origin of the Species. The play within a play, rich with historical detail and larger-than-life characters, could stand easily on its own. At times, it’s actually more interesting than what’s going on with the characters behind the scenes.

The play draws parallels and comparisons between the conflicts faced by Darwin and his rival, Robert Fitzroy, who wants nothing more than to keep the findings of The Origin of the Species buried, and those facing the work’s actors, writer and director. But not all these modern-day characters quite register with us – the sympathetic back story of foreign director Millie (Elizabeth H. Richards) is moving enough, but she’s also caught up in an out-of-nowhere romance with the man playing Fitzroy (Grady Weatherford). The noble writer (Dallas Darttanian Miller) is a bit too idealized, and the actor playing Darwin (Eric Messner) a bit too shallow, for us to fully connect with them.