This is the umpteenth, now annual, offering of six short plays produced by HER Productions, featuring female writers and directors under their banner title of Vignettes. This evening we watched 'Six Letters To The NHS'.
All six plays were actually quite similar in many ways. They all tackled hard-hitting medical problems with a deal of humour and could all be described as serio-comic in their structure, they all (with the notable exception of one piece) featured only two actors / actresses, and they all were grounded very much in reality and actuality. Perhaps the running order could have been changed a little to make optimum impact of each scenario, but that did not stop each play packing its own individual punch when needed. On entering the auditorium the cast for the first three plays (i.e. those in the first act) were already seated on the sides of a large, open stage, with the set and props needed for each strewn amongst them. A very Brechtian touch meaning the performers were seated as silent witnesses to each others' stories which, had the performance area been made smaller, would have made the production more introspective and focussed and might have had a bigger impact than it in its present form did.
The six plays took us through such subjects as 999 ambulance telephone operators, the minefield of dating, teenage and youth cancer treatment, stomach cancer, delivering babies in various guises, planning a pregnancy, and an interesting history lesson about the Windrush immigrants. The directing of each piece varied considerably, but those who chose to ignore the fourth wall and the audience succeeded better overall, whilst individual noteworthy performances which impressed were Nicola Gardner and Lydia Hasoon in Channique Sterling Brown's 'Born/Borne'; Erin Shanagher in Alex Keelan's 'You're So Brave' (whose performance actually had me in tears), and the excellently measured performance of Maya Dhokia - ably supported by Louisa May Parker and Melissa Parker in Rosa Hesmondhalgh's 'Unit H6'.
Reviewer - Alastair Zyggu
on - 1.5.25
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