PLAYS : Head/Case
This play concerns two mental patients; an Irish woman who can't stop talking and an English women who can't start. A one act-er, it investigates mental illness, metaphysics, politics and relationships. The Irish woman and her male offsider were both magnificent, effortlessly jumping from fast to slow, focus to support, singing to crying. The English woman wasn't quite so strong, though I think this had more to do with direction and the script; her interpretaion of her illness was a little cliched and overbearing.
The theatre itself is great - right in the middle of Soho, with a real Soho feel. While I couldn't find any documentation (tsk, tsk) I believe the works they put on are the produce of the writers that reside there, as it is a 'writer's' centre as well. The room holds about 140, and quickly filled up to a good 80+% on a Thursday night.
Unfortunately I found the play itself quite unfocused... it covered many topics, but never really made a strong commitment to investigating any of them. It had a lot of repitition that it used to demonstrate the 'brain damaged' aspects of the characters, which was used to good effect at some points, but was largely tedious.
The mental illness aspect was quite dominant, and lead to some nice gotchas and story arcs, but it felt unauthentic, unresearched. That's a horrid thing to say when I don't know the process that went into the creation of the piece, but the 'mental illness' as a 'character' in the play felt two dimensional.
The metaphysical aspect was the main story arc, with the characters coming to terms with their changing selves; are they the same person they were before their accidents, are they the same person as the 'healed' person they will be in a few years time, are they the same person as they will be in 5 seconds for that matter! I found this a quite interesting idea, but it just wasn't persued with any rigour and was often clouded by some of the mucking around with brain damage (repition etc)
Then, finally, there was a single scene of 'the Northern Ireland Problem' as we find out how the Irish woman was hurt (and of course she doesn't take sides...) but this seemed to be added just because it was obvious; it had to be there. Not because it added anything to the actual play.
Again, this is a piece I really liked, and that's why I have criticized/analysed it so much. I want works like this to be fantastic, not just good.
The theatre itself is great - right in the middle of Soho, with a real Soho feel. While I couldn't find any documentation (tsk, tsk) I believe the works they put on are the produce of the writers that reside there, as it is a 'writer's' centre as well. The room holds about 140, and quickly filled up to a good 80+% on a Thursday night.
Unfortunately I found the play itself quite unfocused... it covered many topics, but never really made a strong commitment to investigating any of them. It had a lot of repitition that it used to demonstrate the 'brain damaged' aspects of the characters, which was used to good effect at some points, but was largely tedious.
The mental illness aspect was quite dominant, and lead to some nice gotchas and story arcs, but it felt unauthentic, unresearched. That's a horrid thing to say when I don't know the process that went into the creation of the piece, but the 'mental illness' as a 'character' in the play felt two dimensional.
The metaphysical aspect was the main story arc, with the characters coming to terms with their changing selves; are they the same person they were before their accidents, are they the same person as the 'healed' person they will be in a few years time, are they the same person as they will be in 5 seconds for that matter! I found this a quite interesting idea, but it just wasn't persued with any rigour and was often clouded by some of the mucking around with brain damage (repition etc)
Then, finally, there was a single scene of 'the Northern Ireland Problem' as we find out how the Irish woman was hurt (and of course she doesn't take sides...) but this seemed to be added just because it was obvious; it had to be there. Not because it added anything to the actual play.
Again, this is a piece I really liked, and that's why I have criticized/analysed it so much. I want works like this to be fantastic, not just good.
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