Medicine & The Same: two plays (NHB Modern Plays)

Enda Walsh

• Publisher: Nick Hern Books
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN: 9781839040238
• eBook ISBN: 9781788504058
• Topic: Letteratura
• Subtopic: Teatro britannico

How long have you been here, John?
– I don't know.
And what brought you here?
– That's difficult to answer.

John Kane is sitting on a hospital gurney, and very shortly a jazz percussionist, two women called Mary, a very old man and a giant lobster will arrive. Then everything will start.

Enda Walsh's new play Medicine is a dark and frequently absurdist work that shatters the boundary between cast and audience. It is a devastatingly funny and moving meditation on how, for decades, we have treated those we call mentally ill.

It was premiered by Landmark Productions and Galway International Arts Festival at the Edinburgh International Festival in August 2021 prior to its opening at the Galway International Arts Festival in September.

Medicine is published here alongside Enda Walsh's 2017 play The Same.

MEDICINE

Medicine received its world premiere at the Traverse Theatre as part of Edinburgh International Festival on 7 August 2021, prior to its opening at Galway International Arts Festival on 4 September, 2021. It was developed with the support of the National Theatre, London. The cast and creative team was as follows:

JOHN		Domhnall Gleeson
MARY 1		Aoife Duffin
MARY 2		Clare Barrett
DRUMMER		Seán Carpio
VOICES		Cathy Belton, Zara Devlin, Seannan Forde, Daniel Harrison, Toby Lavelle, Seán McGinley, Aaron Monaghan, Mikel Murfi, Tadhg Murphy, Cormac Quinlan, Marty Rea
Writer/Director		Enda Walsh
Composer		Teho Teardo
Set Designer		Jamie Vartan
Lighting Designer		Adam Silverman
Sound Designer		Helen Atkinson
Costume Designer		Joan O’Clery
Live Drumming		Seán Carpio
(Composition and performance)
Associate Director		Eoghan Carrick
Associate Lighting Designer		Georgie Ekers
Associate Sound Designers		Sinéad Diskin Jamie Ford
Hair and Make-Up		Ola Szczygiel
Fight Director		Philip d’Orléans
Costume Supervisors		Eleanor Dolan Maggie Kennedy
Props Supervisor		Lizzie Chapman
Production Manager		Eamonn Fox
Stage Manager		Kate Watkins
Deputy Stage Manager		Sophie Flynn
Technical Managers		Colm Robinson, Tom Rohan
Set Supervisor		Danny Hones
Sound Operator		Amir Sherhan

Landmark Productions and Galway International Arts Festival would like to acknowledge the support of the Arts Council of Ireland and NUI Galway for making the performances in Galway possible, and to Culture Ireland for supporting the performances in Edinburgh.

Characters

JOHN KANE
OLD MAN/MARY
LOBSTER/MARY 2

Also a DRUMMER, and recorded voices

This ebook was created before the end of rehearsals and so may differ slightly from the play as performed.

A curtain opens as fluorescent lights flicker on – and JOHN KANE is walking into this room – and away from a door that’s closing on the back wall.

Outside the room – we can hear clearly the sound of the institution – in the distance people shouting and calling – doors banging, a faraway television…

The room looks like it’s used for various activities like table tennis and bingo and badminton.

There’s a banner overhead reading ‘Congratulations’ – and some tired balloons and a trestle table with the remains of some party food and soft drinks.

There’s a table and chair, with a microphone and desk lamp on the table. Also on the table there’s a battery-powered pencil sharpener, two pencils and two scripts.

Near this table – there’s a full drum kit.

Just above the fluorescent lights – there’s a busy lighting rig.

Visible also is a metal trolley with electronic sound equipment on it.

At the back of the room is a large booth with a glass window – were it not for the closed curtain we’d be able to see into this booth.

Stage-right – there’s a much smaller booth – a cubicle, really.

JOHN is standing in blue pyjamas and wearing beaten-up runners.

He’s holding other clothes – neatly folded.

He stares up at the ‘Congratulations’ banner.

He walks quickly to a bench in the far stage-left – places down his clothes and shoes – grabs a chair – and positions the chair beneath the banner and stands up to take it down –

The fluorescent lights immediately go out – but for the light in the ‘cubicle’.

It’s calling him. A little red light has come on – on the side of the cubicle.

JOHN gets off the chair – walks towards the cubicle and steps inside – closes the curtain behind him – sits down at a tiny desk – putting on a pair of headphones.

Immediately the sounds of the institution cut.

JOHN leaning into the microphone –

JOHN. Hello, can you hear me?

A long pause in which we (and JOHN) can hear a breath.

I can hear you breathing…

INTERVIEWER (voice-over). How are you today…?

JOHN. Good. I wanted to ask what the room was used for last night. It’s messy and I don’t want to use up any of my time having to clean it. It smells and there’s a banner hanging –

INTERVIEWER (voice-over). How are you today, John?

JOHN. Well, nervous! – which you can hear… I realise that the staff have to let loose now and again – but only once a year I get the opportunity to come to this room…

INTERVIEWER (voice-over). How are you today, John?

JOHN. I’m fine, thank you. I’m…

INTERVIEWER (voice-over). How long have you been in here?

JOHN is then heard in voiceover.

JOHN (voice-over). I don’t know.

INTERVIEWER (voice-over). And what brought you here?

JOHN (voice-over). That’s difficult to answer.

JOHN sits listening to the interview.

INTERVIEWER (voice-over). And whose idea was it that you’d come here, John?

JOHN (voice-over). My parents and a doctor in my town.

INTERVIEWER (voice-over). And what happened that ended up with you being here?

Suddenly the door in the back wall crashes open – an OLD MAN is seen entering the room fast, carrying a sports bag – the door closing behind him.

JOHN carries on talking to the intervie...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title page
• Contents
• Medicine
• The Same
• About the Author
• Copyright and Performing Rights Information