Today, as all thoughts turn to the 116 children who walked to school at Aberfan for the final time, Vision Arts is preparing for a production that explores the grief, guilt, greed and religion that a group of mothers endured as they learnt to deal with the trauma of their children’s deaths.

The Revlon Girl tells the story of four bereaved mothers who meet every week above a local hotel to talk, cry and sometimes even laugh, as they try not to feel guilty.

At one of their meeting, despite their over-riding feelings that others might think them frivolous, the mothers arrange to meet a representative from Revlon to come and give them a talk on beauty tips.

The evening falls just eight months after the tragedy when, in 1966, the coal tips comprising man-made hills of discarded coal, slid down onto the village, killing a total of 144 people in just a few minutes. Of those, 116 were the children who had just arrived at school for their morning lessons.

Despite its tragic subject matter, The Revlon Girl is full of laughter, mainly the result of the interplay between four of the women who have known each other since childhood, and the awkwardness of the outsider from Revlon, who has travelled from across the English border in Bristol.

Trapped by the expectations and etiquette of grieving, the women turn to the power of putting on make-up as a means of moving forward and surviving.

The Revlon Girl will be performed at The Boulevard Theatre, Milford Haven, on October 26 to 28.