CHANGE OF HEART. To 6 March.
London
CHANGE OF HEART
by Rosemary Friedman
New End Theatre To 6 March 2004
Tue-Sat 7.30pm Sat & Sun 3.30pm
Runs 2hr 20min One interval
TICKETS: 020 7794 0022
www.newendtheatre.co.uk
Review: Timothy Ramsden 15 February
Plenty of heart doesn't give a play life.Though it has a subject the impact of transplants Rosemary Friedman's play lacks a focus. The psychological impact on beneficiaries of new organs, speculation about whether the body parts bring the previous owner's mentality, the doctor-patient relationship, even a touch of an ethical Doctor's Dilemma - are all served up within a perfunctory dramatic structure that seems at the will of a thematic jigsaw one never adding up to a big picture. There's even a touch of product placement.
A 43-year old scientist, whose research could make transplants a thing of our barbarous past (human immune systems seek to reject new tissues, having no notion of friendly purpose), awaits new heart and lungs. Julie-Kate Olivier puffs effortfully till she's renewed, when irritation takes over from physical effort unexplained, though John Kay Steel's husband's intrusively questioning enough to irritate anyone, with or without a medical condition.
Also waiting is 17-year old Liverpudlian Anna- a brightly characterful performance from Estelle Morgan whose playful flirtation with her doctor leads her to believe she's more than just a patient. It's part of this play's muddle that the dilemma over who's to have the next available heart Jessie and Anna are both perfect matches for it - is resolved by one being unable to take the organ, while the pudding's over-egged with a simultaneous train crash, making dead bodies abundant. If it's tough getting an operation as a character in this play, offstage humanity's written off with a few statements Jessie demand for priority, her admission I pray for someone else's death.
Domestic detail limited for Anna (Clive Moore trying well with an underdeveloped role as the patient's impatient TV actor-dad), drearily plentiful for Jessie is trudged through with realistic details that clutter rather than illuminate. Texting, party arrivals and departures are mistimed, things are read out unconvincingly to provide information. Conflicts are manufactured out of nothing no sooner has Jessie walked in than we're treated to her husband's discourse on the importance of mathematics. None of this is helped by Michael Gielata's sluggish production.
The gripping play on transplants still waits to be written.
Dermot Tanney: John Kay Steel
Professor Jessie Sands: Julie-Kate Olivier
Professor Eduardo Cortes: Gary Condes
Dr Balasubramanian: Emilio Doorgasingh
Anna Robinson: Estelle Morgan
Jack Robinson: Clive Moore
Director: Michael Gielata
Designer: Angela Simpson
Lighting: Guy Kornetzki
Sound: Shock Productions
Choreographer: Pablo Alonso
2004-02-16 01:42:56