A NHS play from 2011 feels very out-dated, says John Nathan
April 26, 2020 11:48Nina Raine’s National Health Service play was first seen at the Hampstead Theatre in 2011. Though it premiered after her Royal Court work Tribes — about a spectacularly argumentative Jewish family -— it was written before.
Tiger Country, a surgical term used to convey the dangers of operating near an artery, now returns as part of the Hampstead at Home online season until Sunday after which you can stream Howard Brenton’s The Arrest Of Ai WeiWei based on the dissident artist’s own account of his treatment by the Chinese government.
There was probably no intended link. But with the NHS today fighting a virus that was first discovered in China, where it is said doctors who warned about the pathogen were visited by police, you might argue that neither work would be available to view now were it not for the Chinese government’s instinct to suppress unwanted voices.
So this revival couldn’t be better timed. And yet although Rain’s dialogue is characteristically fizzing and the author interweaves enough plot-lines to keep a hospital TV drama going for years, the play feels as dated as it does relevant.
Central is Indira Varma’s arrogant, Indian-born surgeon Vashti who is caught between chauvinistic consultant bosses above her and insolent clinicians below. More directly than any TV drama would dare ,tricky racist tropes are tackled head on, such as her impatience with black female nurses.
Ruth Everett is terrific as the newbie A&E doctor Emily who has yet to learn that it is not possible to save every patient and Alistair Mackenzie is also excellent as a weary cardiologist who in one chilling moment is diagnosed as being unwell by an eerily intuitive patient in his care.
But that scene is not the only one that barely survives the ropy camera angles . In real life people breezed through Lizzie Clachan’s airy set, on screen the design resembles hospital interiors only in their blandness.
True, we still marvel at the commitment, intelligence and talent of under-resourced lifesavers — all qualities captured by the excellent cast. But today’s NHS is very different from the one depicted here. The result is like watching a play set in pre-war Britain while living through the conflict. Dilemmas seem pettier. Today’s doctors might look at their counterparts of ten years ago and think, “you don’t know how lucky you are.”