‘Pressure Drop’ and ‘Saving Grace’ demonstrate contrasting styles
THEATREGOERS MIGHT be intrigued at the very different approaches taken to serious family problems by two equally successful plays currently on our stages. Spoiler alert: both Basil Dawkins’ Pressure Drop (Little Little Theatre) and Fabian Barracks’ Saving Grace (Phoenix Theatre) end happily. For those who have been following Dawkins’ productions for a while - perhaps even since his first commercial one,
Flatmate, in 1980 – the upbeat ending will come as no surprise. Dawkins insists that he writes ‘dramedies’ which see-saw between comedy and serious drama and generally climax‘ comedically’
But Pressure Drop is much more serious than comic and its grave subjects keep pushing it towards tragedy up to the last scene. In fact, as the final lights fade, we feel that the bush tonic and powder offered as a remedy to a major health problem might not be effective.
Dawkins writes that the play is about “love, family, ageing; the tensions in deep, rural, traditional Jamaican communities caused by the lure of the cities and the conflicts created by rapid changes in the culture, attitudes and values of ordinary rural folks.”
More specifically, the play deals with addiction, homelessness, joblessness, intolerance, and dementia. Dawkins’ metaphoric statement on the solution to those problems runs: “Love is the viable platform, forgiveness is the vehicle and optimism and diligence the track and engine.”
PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS
All this might sound too weighty to be entertaining. Not so. For one, Dawkins dramatises the problems and solutions through the lives of believable characters – Papa/ Matthew (Earle Brown), his son, Luke (Canute Fagan), Luke’s wife, Deslin (Maylynne Lowe) and Deslin’s mother, Dotsy (Ruth Ho Shing). Thanks to the natural talent and the experience of the actors, as well as the expertise of the director, Douglas Prout, the characters come across as real people with whom we can empathise.
Secondly, the setting is a home in a traditional rural community, a home symbolised by one of those Georgian-style houses that still dot the countryside.
Set designer Patrick Russell did a fine job with it.
Thirdly, the ambient sounds (crickets, frogs, the bray of a donkey) and the music heard throughout (mento, reggae, and gospel) support the tone of the story. Light and sound designer Dorraine Reid is to be commended.