Takin Over The Asylum/The Donahue Sisters

The Livingston Players have successfully demonstrated in their two autumn plays the best and worst of human nature.

 ‘The Donahue Sisters’ is a dark one act play where  three sisters Annie, Rosie and Dunya,  played by Kate Halliday, Annie Townsend and Sammy Jo Dodds  catch up  in their old playroom attic.  They bring out humour in their petty rivalries and in their smoking drugs.  But the darker side to their lives emerges: Rosie’s family beats her up; Annie and her husband do not communicate; and Dunya’s husband is having an affair. Then they re-enact their childhood secret taking the audience with them in fascinated horror and successfully creating a chill at the ease with which three bored girls move from innocent experiment to dark violence. The incongruity of their actions against the background of a playroom filled with toys was not lost on the audience while the lighting and use of the white chair was clever and sinister.

‘Takin Over The Asylum’ , its amateur premier, seemed at first a welcome breath of air with a humorous but sympathetic portrayal of inmates of a psychiatric unit who considered themselves  ‘loonies’ yet who showed otherwise in their campaign to keep their hospital radio. Craig Potter as Eddie the outsider who came in to be their DJ exemplified a compassionate and rational approach. He was well matched with Alistair Thomas as Campbell who exuded nervous energy as the manic campaigner and whose well timed delivery of his comments on the asylum and inmates gave much of the production its life. Likewise Judy Hutchinson brought humour as the cleaning obsessed Rosalie and her efficiency as an organiser. Also making a telling job of the difficulties of life within and outside the asylum were Lynne Hurst as Francine and John Ward as Fergus. These roles contrasted well with the cold and obstructive efficiency of the hospital administrator Evelyn played by Pam Murray and the harshness of the hospital staff. The uncomfortable side for the audience was appreciating how human all these characters were and how difficult it is to get past officialdom. The setting of an institutionalised environment with its net curtains, utilitarian chairs, and entry system made this point too.

Congratulations to all for an enjoyable and thought-provoking evening.

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