THE FINAL SHOT. To 27 October.
London
THE FINAL SHOT
by Ben Ellis
Theatre 503 Latchmere Pub 503 Battersea Park Road SW11 3BW To 27 October 2007.
Tue-Sat 8pm Sun 5pm
Runs 1hr 20min No interval.
TICKETS: 020 7978 7040
www.theatre503.com
Review: Timothy Ramsden 21 October.
Fine acting and production for well-considered matter of life and death.
Dealing with serious disease in the media is difficult: how much can you show, and how do you avoid exploiting suffering for emotional effect? TV documentary-maker Josh Cameron has no doubts about dealing with the condition eating the life from an old friend he’s rediscovered after 16 years.
He wants to film till Adam’s dying breath. His producer Carmel McCain’s highly doubtful, a difference mirrored in Adam’s family between wife Tess, who supports Josh filming, and son Michael, who violently objects.
He has his own reason, for what’s killing Adam is Huntington’s Disease, a condition carried genetically in a 50:50 ratio. Michael’s refused the test which would say if he’ll develop Huntington’s, but his worry that any slip of memory, or his temper, might be a first symptom, generates his outright hostility.
Yet Carmel, who’s all concern for family consent and whether viewers will accept the televised moment of death, backs the project precisely because of Michael’s 50% chance of inheriting Huntington’s. Josh is genuinely concerned for his friend, while Tess hopes the moment when death arrives will return the husband she knew to her for an instant.
Playwright Ben Ellis soon shows the man inside the debilitated body that can neither swallow nor talk; Fred Pearson handles the transitions to an earlier time skilfully, leaning forward in bed, arms relaxing from their contorted lock, talking to Michael as a boy, or Tess in their early days. Later, Pearson stands, Adam freed from the bondage of sickness.
When the end arrives and Pearson climbs back into bed, Tim Roseman’s clear, sympathetic production achieves a remarkable warmth. All contribute, but none more than Susannah York, who suggests years of love enduring below the suffering and pain in her quiet intimacy with Adam.
Throughout, whoever Tess talks with, York maintains Tess's sense of certainty. The production’s weakest when loudness breaks out with self-conscious theatricality. Yet, one shouting session apart, Peter Gowen’s Josh, matching professional and personal concern, and Benson, making clear the worries of a TV executive on dangerous territory, offer a fine contrast between the rugged film-maker and smoothly responsible executive.
Carmel McCain: Candida Benson.
Josh Cameron: Peter Gowen.
Michael Fine: Tom McKay.
Adam Fine: Fred Pearson.
Tess Fine: Susannah York.
Director: Tim Roseman.
Designer: Hayden Griffin.
Lighting: Johanna Town.
Sound: Fergus O’Hare.
Movement: Anna Morrisey.
Dramaturg: Sarah Dickenson.
Assistant director: Dan Coleman.
Assistant designer: Mika Handley.
2007-10-22 02:11:36