Theatre
A Number
St James Cavalier

When an ethical hot potato makes it to the stage and permeates the cultural consciousness of a country, then it’s time that some serious thought be given to the manner in which it is being dealt with by the powers that be.

Churchill’s play focuses on the social, emotional and moral repercussions of cloning – which takes a highly-skewed side-track from any form of assisted fertility

While our country is still grappling with the measures imposed by the new IVF Bill, I found the themes in Caryl Churchill’s excellent play, A Number,currently playing at St James Cavalier, rather difficult to reconcile with our country’s stance on the aforementioned law.

The fact of the matter is that Churchill’s play focuses on the social, emotional and moral repercussions of cloning – which takes a highly-skewed side-track from any form of assisted fertility.

Unifaun Theatre’s production of this two-hander, featuring veteran actor John Suda in the role of Salter, the father, and the accomplished Mikhail Basmadjian as the human in question and his clones, painted a poignant picture of what might occur in a situation where an original is cloned and the long-term effects of this experiment go too far – much farther than Salter originally planned.

The tragedy of A Number lies in its title – the number of attempts made by Salter to get it right, so to speak, as a father; coupled with the number (which is never quite specified) of extra clones that were created without his knowledge by unscrupulous doctors.

Two of these clones are played by Basmadjian, along with the original son, Bernard 1, whose vindictive streak and resentment at having been rejected in childhood exposes a far darker side than one might imagine.

What was so terrifying to consider was that the two clones, Bernard 2 and later Michael Black, were so much more amiable and pleasant men, exposing the fact that nurture has as important a role to play as nature in character formation.

Suda gave his Salter the emotional depth it required to propel him as both a deluded, selfish man whose sole ambition is to redeem himself by means of providing the best he can for “the best son” he can have, to the detriment of his original son; and as a man who is deeply sorry for the long-term result of his actions.

Rather than appear to be playing the same role with split personalities, Basmadjian, on the other hand, managed very successfully to create three distinct character strains which were still linked in terms of perspective but whose demeanour is quite varied and distinguished among the three to good effect.

Salter’s constant dwelling and later probing on whether one of the clones he’d just found out about, Michael Black, was happy and his implication that he’d rather like to think that his life was not as pleasant as Bernard 2’s was shocking, because it exposed the father’s underlying desire for achieving perfection on his own terms.

The directorial vision that Chris Gatt had was executed with solid timing and clever lighting.

It was clear from the onset that this performance was going to work because it touched a variety of levels – the technical, the interpretative and, most importantly, the communicative. It certainly gives one food for thought and makes for a good night out.

A Number is also being staged on Friday, Saturday and Sunday at 8pm.