Skip to main content

REVIEW: The Effect at Coal Mine Theatre

int(100673)
iPhoto caption: Photo by Dahlia Katz.
/By / Jul 18, 2023
SHARE

It’s not often I’m unable to summon the words for a theatrical review.

But it’s also not often that a production swings so widely and hits so assuredly as in The Effect, presented in a dazzling Canadian premiere at Coal Mine Theatre. Lucy Prebble’s script echoes the very best of her work on Succession — sharp observations on brains and the demons inside them — and the work has found its match in director Mitchell Cushman, playful and innovative as usual. It’s a worthy watch, this Effect, as emotionally weighty as Coal Mine’s recent Yerma and The Sound Inside, but with a hair more mirth to counter its psychological depth. (More on that later.)

Prebble’s premise is simple: we’re in a clinical drug trial for an antidepressant of some sort. Connie and Tristan are patients, seemingly from distant walks of life in the real world but suddenly equalized in this bubble of medical routine. Lorna and Toby, meanwhile, are the so-called professionals, the psychiatrist administering the trial and the doctor holding its puppet strings.

When Connie and Tristan fall in love, the results are mixed — and devastating.

This is a cast and creative team for the ages, an all-star group of #theaTO luminaries. Cushman’s made magic once again with frequent collaborator Nick Blais, who’s credited here for the show’s exquisite set, lighting, and prop design. Blais’ set makes use of modular chairs, cleverly constructed with hinged slats of wood. The chairs become tables and medical examination beds at the drop of a hat, and they’re not only functional, but damn stylish — it’s perhaps some of the best set design we’ll see in Toronto this year. Those chairs are bolstered on each side of the alley-configured playing space with multi-purpose screens, in another wonderfully creative feat of design. Lighting choices, too, milk the drama of Prebble’s script for all it’s worth; in one particularly gutsy (and lengthy) sequence, the teensy Coal Mine is lit by only a flashlight, and it so works.

Leah Doz is a sublime Connie, with all the subtlety of a seasoned film actor but all the precision of a body accustomed to the stage. She plays well against Aris Athanasopoulos’ Tristan, who balances dorky flirtation with intriguing grit in his advances upon Connie. The two have an undeniable chemistry that’s thrilling to watch.

Aviva Armour-Ostroff and Jordan Pettle complete the ensemble as Lorna and Toby, adding an incisive, decidedly adult edge to the love story blooming between Connie and Tris. They frequently argue — about their pasts, about the efficacy of antidepressants, about suicide — but their dynamic has a surprising number of levels to it, and not once does it feel one-note.

In short, yes, The Effect is a marvel, one I’ll likely see again before it shutters. It’s a close competitor, in both quality and emotional resonance, to the company’s 2022 production of The Antipodes, a show I continue to think about daily more than a year later.

There’s a “but,” though, in the larger context around this show.

The Effect is the third in a series of crushingly dark plays about the chasms of mental illness at Coal Mine. From Yerma, to The Sound Inside, to now The Effect, each Coal Mine production in 2023 has launched audiences into the darkest depths of the human condition — and I’m not convinced the season curation, or all of the individual productions, have offered audiences the levity needed to temper that darkness. The Effect is by far the strongest show of the three, the play closest to starting a conversation about mental illness rather than simply bearing witness to it, but from a programming perspective, I’m left unsure of what Coal Mine has been trying to say this year. From Yerma’s grim display of self-inflicted gore to The Sound Inside’s assisted suicide, this season has carried its audiences from one pit to another, and it’s left us somewhere only slightly lighter with the conclusion of The Effect. 

The addition of optional trigger warnings to the website and within the theatre facility is great — and given the subject matter of these plays, necessary — but 2023’s Coal Mine season has painted a startlingly dire portrait of what it means to be mortal. In their next, I’d be thrilled to see something even a step closer to a comedy; the company has the talent to explore a broader range of atmospheres than perhaps we’ve seen this year.

While Coal Mine’s season programming remains a tad puzzling to me, The Effect does not, and it earns my unmitigated recommendation. Go go go. 


The Effect runs at Coal Mine Theatre through July 30. Tickets are available here.


Intermission reviews are independent and unrelated to Intermission’s partnered content. Learn more about Intermission’s partnership model here.

Aisling Murphy
WRITTEN BY

Aisling Murphy

Aisling is Intermission's former senior editor and the theatre reporter for the Globe and Mail. She likes British playwright Sarah Kane, most songs by Taylor Swift, and her cats, Fig and June. She was a 2024 fellow at the National Critics Institute in Waterford, CT.

LEARN MORE

Comments

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *


/
Zorana Sadiq and Noah Grittani in Comfort Food. Photo by Dahlia Katz. iPhoto caption: Zorana Sadiq and Noah Grittani in Comfort Food. Photo by Dahlia Katz.

REVIEW: World premiere of Comfort Food is anything but comfortable — and that’s why it works

In an era of endless broadcasts, Comfort Food questions what it means to truly connect. The show skewers the spectacle-hungry media machine, but also explores how adults contort themselves for approval, how networks co-opt authenticity, and how algorithms radicalize kids in real time.

By Krystal Abrigo
Kelly Wong as Aslan and Élodie Gillett as the White Witch with the cast of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Photo by David Cooper. iPhoto caption: Kelly Wong as Aslan and Élodie Gillett as the White Witch with the cast of 'The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.' Photo by David Cooper.

REVIEW: Shaw Festival’s The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe needs a louder roar

Sometimes, theatre transports you to a fantastic new world. Other times, you get a wardrobe full of coats.

By Emily R. Zarevich
Sanctuary Song at Tapestry Opera. iPhoto caption: Photo by Dahlia Katz.

REVIEW: Tapestry Opera’s Sanctuary Song charts an elephant’s tumultuous journey from captivity to liberation

The Dora Award-winning, family-friendly opera has returned to mark the opening of Tapestry's new venue on Yonge Street.

By Nirris Nagendrarajah
Production photo of 'Pride and Prejudice' at the Grand Theatre. iPhoto caption: Photo by Dahlia Katz.

REVIEW: Pride and Prejudice gets a postmodern makeover at London’s Grand Theatre

In spite of some missed opportunities, Pride and Prejudice ends up a lighthearted recontextualization of its source material, which should appease all but the most stolid Janeites.

By Gwen Caughell
Soulpepper's production of Takwahiminana iPhoto caption: Photo by Dahlia Katz.

REVIEW: Takwahiminana explores what healing means when the past never quite lets go

While playwright Matthew MacKenzie’s lyrical storytelling is always a delight, there’s something astringent and detached about Takwahiminana that produces a distancing effect, preventing it from reaching the emotional highs of his other recent work.

By Ilana Lucas
The Grand and Theatre Aquarius' production of Waitress. iPhoto caption: Photo by Dahlia Katz.

REVIEW: Waitress blends retro charm with contemporary flair at Hamilton’s Theatre Aquarius

This co-production with the Grand Theatre stands up to its Broadway counterpart and makes for a truly delightful night out.

By Deanne Kearney