Love in a time of depression

A revival of Lucy Prebble’s The Effect raises big questions and, if the rain holds off, a rousing outdoor musical should raise the spirits

- Michael Billington

LUCY PREBBLE’S The Effect was a big hit at the National nine years ago. It is back there now in a strong revival by Jamie Lloyd in a radically reconfigured Lyttelton. Seeing it a second time, I was struck by its intellectual power and its relation to other plays that question modern medical practice. As do Joe Penhall’s Blue/Orange and Harold Pinter’s The Hothouse, which Mr Lloyd once directed, it asks how much faith we should place in doctors and institutions that treat patients as human guinea pigs.

Miss Prebble’s set-up is clear. Tristan, who hails from Hackney ‘before it fell’, and Connie, a psychology student from Canada, agree to take part in a four-week trial of an anti-depressant drug. In their isolation, they find a mild flirtation turning into a passionate fling, but they are never sure whether this is genuine love or the result of dopamine. The medics in charge are also bewildered. Lorna, who is supervising the experiment, feels she has lost control and Toby, the hospital’s head honcho, has total faith in the drug’s ameliorative powers.

Behind the play lurk big philosophical questions about the nature of love and depression. Can the former be artificially stimulated? Can the latter be medically remedied? If I read the play correctly, Miss Prebble is endorsing the power of human agency. Love, she implies, is ultimately the result of the heart’s affections.

The debate about depression is even more fascinating. Lorna, a working-class black woman, argues that it stems from social and economic conditions. Toby, her boss and ex-lover, clings to the power of pills to remedy a chemical imbalance. Although Miss Prebble is fair to both sides, I suspect her sympathies lie with Lorna.