| Perfectly paced and nuanced |
Kaite O'Reilly |
| Sherman Cymru- the Almond and the Seahorse , Clwyd Theatr Cymru Mold on 4th April , April 17, 2008 |
As Dr Falmer explains, musical memory is often retained when other memory functions are lost or fractured. So it’s not too surprising that Kaite O’Reilly’s powerful and moving play has much in common with chamber music.Here are voices and words forming patterns, now together, now far apart, now in harmony, now in discord. Sometimes the main theme is carried by one voice, sometimes by more, sometimes by unexpected combinations. Forming the spine of the piece is Dr Falmer herself, acting like the ground bass in baroque music, holding everything together. Except that she too has a memory trauma to face but the need to calm other people’s fears means she has no one she can confide in. None of this musicality would work if we weren’t faced with five fractured lives that we care about. But these are people, both in writing and performance, that we desperately care for. And the dilemma is should we care more for the victims, who actually have their own worlds to inhabit, or for their partners, who find themselves faced by people they no longer truly know? Gwennan went through a car windscreen and is still living in the time just before it happened. Tom is her husband, except that he’s a stranger to her because her husband simply can’t be that old. Ian Saynor’s Tom is pain and confusion personified, desperately trying to bring his wife back to him. Olwen Rees invests Gwennan with quiet dignity, holding onto her Welsh and not really wanting to emerge from her new, almost ordered, world. Joe’s brain was injured as a result of an illness and, although he knows there’s nothing wrong with him, he has memory slippages, often from moment to moment. Sarah as an archaeologist is used to piecing together lives from discovered remains but the more she tries to put Joe back together, the more he thinks it’s her that’s behaving oddly. Celyn Jones’ Joe is superb, his volatility and the reasonableness with which he faces what he sees as extraordinary behaviour in others, is stunningly well judged. Nia Gwynne really makes you feel Sarah’s frustrations. Here is an educated, organised woman who is faced with something that she can do nothing to change and she’s rapidly reaching breaking point. Mojisola Adebayo is very fine as the doctor. Whether counselling or delivering a lecture she is utterly convincing and the revelation of her own vulnerability makes her isolation particularly poignant. Phillip Zarrilli’s direction is perfectly paced and nuanced. Fiona Watt’s multi-levelled set is both practical and atmospheric. If the plays to come from Sherman Cymru are only half as good as this, then the future is bright indeed. |
Reviewed by: Victor Hallett |
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