The Heretic

The Heretic

By Richard Bean

Library Theatre Company

The Lowry, 28 September 2012

It is a difficult trick to pull off, a play that addresses or deals with scientific issues in an intelligent manner.

For on the one hand there is the imperative to deliver drama, entertainment and memorable characters.  Yet, on the other hand, you must be accurate when it comes to the science, as objective as science prides itself on being.  To invent a perpetual motion machine would seem to be an easier proposition.

Bean’s main character Dr. Diane Cassell (Cate Hamer) is a scientist who is sceptical about the consensus when it comes to claims of global warming, climate change caused by human activity.  Around her, Bean constructs a quirky and ultimately quite moving comedy.

The play succeeds, yes because of its humour, but above all because these characters, and especially the young, are shown to be as fragile (and perhaps as damaged) as the eco-system itself.  It’s also fortunate for Bean that his play has been brought to life by as astute a director as Chris Honer and this terrific cast.  They were wonderful, with Stuart Fox as Kevin, a career academic whose hippie past glimmers dimly then sparks into life, being the pick of the performances for me.

Certain lines in the play will undoubtedly age – references to The Archers and EastEnders, say – but if a play puts you in mind of Copenhagen and Arcadia (and reminds you, incidentally, how well Honer and company did with that one) then it must have an awful lot going for it.  This Library Theatre production of The Heretic, at The Lowry until 13 October, does just that.  Details of future performances can be found below:

http://www.librarytheatre.com/event/the-heretic/ 

http://www.thelowry.com/event/the-heretic

Arcadia by Tom Stoppard

Arcadia
By Tom Stoppard
Library Theatre Company
The Lowry, 24 September 2010

Charlie Anson (Septimus Hodge) and Beth Park (Thomasina Coverly) in Arcadia by Tom Stoppard. Photo by Gerry Murray

What should you get for a play that has everything?  Such an easy question to answer: a Library Theatre production.

Arcadia has an inventive structure, what with the forth-and-back timeshifts between the Romantic age and the present day.  It is chockfull of ideas, as with all of Stoppard’s work, and it deals in particular with the clash between the two cultures of art and science, poetry and mathematics.  All attempts by we poor mortal beings to find meaning, pattern and beauty in the universe.  There’s also – again as per normal with Stoppard – a lot of dry wit on display, and an entirely earned and warranted elegiac ending.

The cast were variously excellent, from Cate Hamer as Hannah the pernickety independent scholar to Leigh Symonds as Ezra Chater, a character straight out of the pages of Smollett, to Joe Shalom, who gave an affecting performance as Augustus, the lad who’s an elective mute.  Charlie Anson as Septimus Hodge was outstanding, mind; he had a real magnetic presence.

This is a play that will move you, make you laugh and tickle your brain cells too.  You will find this production to be well-nigh perfect.  Perfectly acted, perfectly paced, perfectly realised overall.

Arcadia, a Library Theatre production, is showing at The Lowry until 9 October.  Full details here.