Alexander Zeldin doesn’t mind making his audience uncomfortable. An earlier play, Faith, Hope and Charity portrayed a modern-day soup kitchen, peopled by those who had fallen through the net of the welfare state. It would be wrong, though, to assume from this that Zeldin is a political dramatist. He laments society’s failings but his insight is entirely focused on the human – and in this case, utterly devastating – level.
Care is a new iteration of a play he wrote in French some years ago, Une Mort dans la Famille, so no surprise that is indeed all about death and how we approach it. Into Rosanna Vize’s bleak setting of a care home, simultaneously antiseptic and down at heel, steps the magnificent Linda Bassett as Joan, who is under the misapprehension she has come for a spot of respite to recover from a fall.
Rosie Cavaliero and Charlie Webb in CARE at the Young Vic
It becomes apparent that she’s here to stay, though, when her family – careworn daughter, Lynn (sensitively played by Rosie Cavaliero) and two grandsons, Laurie and Robbie (William Lawlor and Ethan Mahoney). There are plenty of brave faces, everyone is struggling and masks inevitably slip.
At first, the confusion and nonsequiturs of the elderly residents do evoke some guffaws in the audience – though as the grim reality of their plight slowly emerges, this dwindles away. The characters, too, are fading away before our eyes, occasionally stepping out of the shadows when we see them, however briefly, for who they really are: the younger, but clearly damaged Simone (Hayley Carmichael delivering some of the evening’s few laughs) or Richard Durden’s kind and gentle John who bursts into life to sing or offer a quiet embrace. Llewella Gideon plays chief carer Hazel with flawless sensitivity – her bed bathing Joan in complete silence is one of the show’s unforgettable moments.
Llewella Gideon, Linda Bassett and Aoife Gaston in CARE at the Young Vic
This is a sad, deeply uncomfortable subject for most of us and Zeldin (he also directs the show) doesn’t make it any easier. His gaze is unflinching but not cold and, against all the odds, he infuses his characters with a true dignity in what is surely the most undignified stage of life, as helpless at the end as they were at the very beginnings of their lives. The whole cast is formidable and received a well-deserved standing ovation. Raw, tough and magnificent.
Care runs at the Young Vic until 11th July. For more information, and for tickets, please visit www.youngvic.org.
Photos by Johan Persson
