The Toronto Theatre Review: Coal Mine’s The Effect

By Ross

She enters and sits, chewing her nails with anxious anticipation, waiting for the trial to begin. The drug kind of test, not a courtroom drama. It’s a tense sharply defined beginning for a captivating play, one that I had seen before many years ago at the Barrow Street Theatre in NYC, but my heads-up on what was about to transpire was foggy. I knew how it starts out, but was not so sure where it would go. Yet I did remember that The Effect, written by Lucy Prebble (“Secret Diary of a Call Girl“) and currently getting its Canadian premiere at Coal Mine Theatre, had a strong emotional effect on me, filling my head with questions about hormones, desire, and the chemistry of love and attraction.

Who are we in the end? Are we just a behavioral response to hormones and chemicals that fly around our bloodstream making us feel certain emotions and attachments? Or is that just us thinking we are in love, rather than really feeling anything beyond just a bunch of symptoms, indications, or side effects?  Are we to hold trust in an emotional state when we are on medication or some type of mental health drugs? Is it making us believe in something that is too hard to notate? Or is it just heightening a possible reality? Prebble certainly seems to think we need to just go with it and dive in completely, mainly because we really have no choice. But to which side do you fall?

Two young people; one man and one woman, enter into this modern, well-formulated, and constructed space, designed cleverly by lighting, set, and prop designer Nick Blais (Outside the March’s Trojan Girls) with strong projection design by Jack Considine (Soulpepper’s The Secret Chord…) and a solid sound design and composition by James Smith (Shaw Festival’s Our Town), to volunteer for a drug test study. It’s a long one, four weeks locked inside, away from cell phones and other electronic devices, and dressed like they are on some cool Lululemon sci-fi spaceship, thanks to the stellar costuming by Cindy Dzib (Outside the March’s No Save Points). The cell phones, we are told, might mess with the medical equipment, so they have to be handed in. But do they really? Or is it a way to control and isolate? That’s exactly what the quickly captivating Tristan thinks. And that statement helps make us lean in and align with him and his way of thinking almost instantaneously. Or is that some sort of hormonal surge?

Played strong and engaging by the very appealing Aris Athanasopolulos (Theatre Aquarius’ Salt Baby), Tristan is just the kind of guy that no drug is required to be drawn to, and Leah Doz (Crave’s “New Eden“) as Connie, the more avoidant one, is just the right kind of foil to feel his effect. They will be given anti-depressants, with weekly increases in dosage, even though they are not depressed. Sad at times, maybe, as we all can be, and as Connie notes, but not clinically depressed, and we, the audience, along with the psychiatrist-in-charge will be watching for the effect these drugs have on these two young souls. And maybe those in charge will be watching a few other things unbeknownst to all involved.

This is the setup for Lucy Prebble’s 2012 play, layered and directed with clarity and wit in the moment and in memory by Mitchell Cushman (Soulpepper’s The Ex-Boyfriend Yard Sale). It’s an effective trial, beautifully laid out and manipulated, as we watch these two charming characters flirt and then fall for each other intensely and recklessly. Is this one of the side effects of the drug that causes dopamine levels to rise? Does it make their blossoming love mean any less if it is drug-induced, as Connie so desperately asks Tristian? Or should they not care and just embrace the feeling regardless of the cause, as Tristian most captivatingly suggests to Connie?

Both actors are fantastic to watch, struggling with their ratchetting up internal monologues of ‘Who’s in control?’, and ‘Is this real?’. Their flashlight-fueled passion and intensity as they ride this roller coaster into an abandoned mental health care facility next door is a study case of what love looks and feels like, and it’s a joy to watch. Especially during the wonderful scene when they steal away together for a midnight escapade. Doz is subtle, a bit closed off, anxious, awkward, and wonderful as her life and will are shattered in a slow unwinding. Her transition from reserved to intoxicated is magnificently subtle and superb to study as she tries to understand her mind and her heart. While Athanasopolulos as the more bohemian and wild-card Tristian first rides the waves with abandonment but then deepens into a more desperate level of love, worthy of the study surrounding him.

Mixed in with this is a complex parallelled relationship between Dr. Toby Sealey, the clinical trial director played solid and edgy by Jordan Pettle (“Murdoch Mysteries“), and the psychiatrist, Dr. Lorna James, unpacked delicately and fascinatingly by Aviva Armour-Ostroff (ARC Stage’s Martyr). Within their discussions of ethics, drug testing validity, and their own sexual chemistry, there lies a more charged debate about whether we are medicating away our own particular emotionality from our collective human existence and personal interactions. Maybe we should be left alone to feel or even embrace our depression and sadness (the difference being left a little too simply defined and casually addressed), and find empowerment for change as a possible outcome. It’s a heady complex topic that sometimes felt too emotional and far too simply debated in maybe a much too contrived setup, but Prebble makes an interesting idea come alive, with lots of questions being asked, but no real obvious answers given.

The Effect certainly had an effect on my brain that night and caused me to ask myself all kinds of questions as I got myself home. (Or was it just those pesky brain chemicals playing havoc on my soul?) The ending feels determined and complex yet not unpacked enough. It leaves us curious, yet deeply engaged. The play is as perfectly administered as can be, after a 5-beat countdown and a quick swallow. It surges through our veins and leaves us asking ourselves more questions than maybe we can manage. And that’s the beauty of Coal Mine Theatre’s The Effect. “You will never feel so crazy as when you fall in love,” said my really good friend to me one rainy night a few years back. And I think Prebble and I can wholeheartedly agree with that summation of a drug trial gone so right and, in a way, so deliciously wrong, all at the same time.