Shock

Shock

Electroconvulsive Therapy is a psychiatric treatment in which seizures are electrically induced in anesthetized patients for therapeutic effect. It is most commonly used as a cure for severe depression although it has also been recognised for its use in the treatment of mania and catatonia. Coincidentally, Jessie Ernest Sanders is one of these said patients and just so happens to conform to the latter.

Awoken from his catatonic state by a method of neurological treatment riddled with side effects and moral questions, Jessie finds himself in a world insistent on his guilt in a crime he cannot remember committing. As he continues to delve into his distorted memories in order to find the truth, he is assisted by the man who has brought him back to consciousness: the mysterious and driven Doctor Peters.

Together they investigate Jessie’s scattered remembrances of a beloved sister, a lover he loved too much and a mother who didn’t love him at all. All of which forces the production to hurtle towards Jessie’s inevitably painful and “shocking” revelation.

This was REC Theatre’s first experiment with the relationship between audience and performance. Transforming their performance space into an illusory world, the audience were stood inside the distorted memories of Jessie with their input and bodily presence within the piece facilitating the climax of the story being told.

 

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