THEATRE REVIEW: The Forgotten - The Coliseum Theatre, Oldham.

The play is set in a small intimate studio, in the Coliseum so the audience is limited, however is was sold out. We sit facing a grey rectangular box about chest height and a chair with a dressing gown on it. As the music starts a smartly dressed man of older years comes on to stage from behind us, muttering a word you can't quite hear but as the music fades it becomes more audible, you hear him repeating the word 'trick', it’s a trick and then he begins to tell us about the card trick, not the secret of it you understand as you could be thrown out of the magic circle for sharing secrets, but how you can make money from doing it and how as a boy he’d seen someone doing it on a street corner and it had caught his imagination. Then strobe lights start as the room goes dark, there are lots of colourful, confusing patterns and voices, different people talking, seemingly all at once but George (Jeff Longmore) is trying to ignore it all and keeps talking about the trick, concentrating, trying to block out what’s going on.

George is only 64 and has early onset dementia, he’s being brought to the home as his wife can no longer look after him. He is confused and his mind wanders back to his mother, whose voice he often seems to hear and fragments of his childhood. At this stage he still knows his wife but thinks he is there  because his mum is on holiday. As his wife bids her farewell he begs not to be left but everyone is reassuring him he will be fine. He becomes stressed and we see the “trick” again, his safe mantra that he uses when confused and frightened.

George seems to live a parallel existence, the reality of where he is gets confused with things from the past. We hear the friendly voices of the staff trying to settle him in and aggressive, menacing voices from his past fusing together in his present, confusing, frightening him.

As the play progresses we see a decline in George, from a man who takes pride in his appearance to someone who, as their mind deteriorates so does their appearance. He gets upset when the staff want to get him to have a wash, at times he becomes aggressive, frightened by voices from the past seeping into what is happening to him in the present. He is scared begging them not to hit him.

Somehow George manages to “escape” from the care home and wanders the streets in his dressing gown. A concerned man stops to ask him if he’s alright and leads him away from the busy traffic. The police come and ask where he is going but he doesn’t know, he can't remember where he lives, more of his mind is slipping away. We hear but never see the various voices of people throughout the play, like the social worker, the staff at the care home and his wife, we see it all through the eyes of George.

Towards the end of the play George is depicted as a shell of himself, no longer smartly dressed but wearing a grey tracksuit, reminiscent of an inmate and doesn’t recognise his wife and sons. In his mind he is a young boy and still thinks his mum is alive. He’s too young to have a wife and asks does his mum like his wife. His wife assures him she does. Words of comfort and reassurance are given, not harsh truths about reality. The question is was he mistreated and hit by the care staff or is he re-living his past in the present?

A deeply moving play, an hour long, the depth of the subject matter makes you reflect on the vulnerability of people with this cruel condition.  Jeff Longmore took you on an intense journey into the chaos and decline of George's mind. Well worth watching.

Reviewer - Catherine Gall
on - 13.5.22