Review: MARJORIE PRIME, Menier Chocolate Factory
Photo credit: Manuel Harlan
Marjorie (Anne Reid) is 85 and experiencing symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease. She has a male companion named Walter (Richard Fleeshman) who tells Marjorie stories from her past, helping her to recall memories. Walter is good looking, much younger than her and strangely robotic. It’s all a bit mysterious.
Enter Tess (Nancy Carroll), Marjorie’s daughter and her husband Jon (Tony Jayawardena) and all becomes clear… Walter is a Prime, a holographic projection of Marjorie’s deceased husband, pumped with Artificial Intelligence. Hired by Jon to bring comfort to his mother-in-law (and some relief to his wife, albeit she is sceptical), Marjorie has chosen a youthful version of Walter.
Marjorie Prime is a commentary on memory, mortality and family relationships. This version of Jordan Harrison’s 2014 Pulitzer Prize nominated play feels almost realistic even though it’s a work of science fiction, set 30 years in the future. The realism is elevated by Dominic Dromgoole’s naturalistic direction of 80 minutes of conversation. When the Prime is not “in use”, it stands still, silent and expressionless at the side of the stage. Black Mirror-ish but far more gentle, secrets are revealed and memories altered by what’s fed to the Prime.
The narrative flips half way through when Marjorie dies and becomes a Prime companion to her daughter. Here, the Prime is cathartic release for Tess who says things to her “mother” that she wouldn’t have said to the real thing!
Jonathan Fensom’s set is a wooden beach house with windows looking out to the horizon. There are clouds by day and stars by night enabling characters to peer out, reminisce and ruminate about an afterlife. The orchestral music adds to the eeriness of a world where robots walk around chatting to humans.
The acting is accomplished. Carroll portrays Tess as serious and harassed, struggling to accept that talking to a machine comforts her mother more than she can. Unravelling after the passing of Marjorie, when she leans into Jon and cries in despair, we feel her pain. Jayawardena is likeable as the good-natured Jon and plays well with Carroll as the yin to her yang.
Fleeshman is a great choice. Tall, handsome and standing resolutely, he’s an imposing Walter Prime who stares like there is nothing behind his eyes and raises the corners of his mouth to smile in a much slower and deliberate way than a human would.
This play though, belongs to the magnificent Anne Reid. Despite her character’s illness, Reid’s Marjorie is light and easy to watch. Even though Walter is robotic, there is real chemistry between him and Marjorie, fuelled by the look of love Reid flashes at Fleeshman as she gazes up at him with a twinkle in her eye.
At 87 years young, Reid proves she is not even close to being past her prime (excuse the pun).
It’s an interesting evening, if not a little alarming if you think too much about what could happen in the future…
**** Four stars
Reviewed by: Victoria Willetts
Marjorie Prime plays at Menier Chocolate Factory until 6 May, with tickets available here.