CANCER TALES. To 14 May.

Ipswich

CANCER TALES
by Nell Dunn

Wolsey Studio To 14 March 2005
Mon-Sat .745pm Mat Sat 2.30pm
Runs 1hr 30min No interval + discussion

TICKETS: 01473 295900
tickets@wolseytheatre.co.uk
www.wolseytheatre.co.uk
Review: Timothy Ramsden 13 May

A play about the prospect of death that is bursting with life.Nell Dunn's title rivals Springtime for Hitler' as audience poison, but it's spot-on. This is the disease that's name so often dare not be spoken. And these are tales, distilled from real lives, full of humour and human energy; Dunn's interlinked monologues have the variety and vitality of a Chaucerian pilgrimage around death.

Cancer brings out the best and the most contradictory in people. The serenity of a young woman for her female lover and unreasonable rage against parental affection are equally natural. Guilt, anger, calmness and humour tumble naturally from the characters Dunn interviewed for her script.

These are primarily tales of young women; older women are relatives watching their children die; bowels and prostates barely rate a walk-on mention. The only story of male cancer is told by a mother (Joanna Bacon, pointing up the incongruity of embarrassment at bathing her grown son, then never seeing him again).

This gives the play an emotional warmth; with men you feel there'd be more beating around the emotional bush. Youth increases the sense of the piece being about living with death, threatened or impending. Some survive; others do not.

Medics get few looks in; the only reflexiveness there comes, significantly, from a nurse who's had the alienating experience of being treated as an out-patient civilian'. Gary Pillai plays several doctors with admiral tact; avoiding excessive mannerisms (always a temptation when playing a series of cameo individuals) he shows the limitations and strengths patients and their families can encounter in hospitals.

Catherine Prendergast's reflective, assertive Clare offers most comment on the medical staff she meets in the course of treatment. Debra Penny's supremely calm Sharon, coming through multiple misdiagnoses for the pain in her breast, wisely realises the question Why? and bitterness are both pointless.

As the screens forming Clare Lyth's set are gradually wheeled aside revealing the initially concealed patients, Rebecca Gatward's controlled, intense production moves to its apogee with Jane Wymark's sustained account of her daughter's final freedom in choosing her moment of departure, it's vivid intensity increased by a moment's recall of the young woman's raucous energy.

Joan: Joanna Bacon
Marilyn/Sally/Barbie: Elizabeth Jasicki
Penny/Rebecca: Laura Macaulay
Sharon: Debra Penny
Men: Gary Pillai
Clare: Catherine Prendergast
Mary: Jane Wymark

Director: Rebecca Gatward
Designer: Claire Lyth
Lighting: Nikk Turnham
Sound: Al Ashford

2005-05-14 10:38:24