Helped by a strong cast but hindered by its ending, Elby Rue shows potential in this sci-fi of today.
If you could change your brain in order to make living more bearable, would you be willing to? Even if that meant relinquishing your humanity? This question is what drives a new play, still in progress, written by Elby Rue. A four-hander, presented in the black-box Camden People’s Theatre, still being performed with script in hand, it’s a heavy subject matter for the causal set-up of an in-progress sharing. The Good Device sees the development of a pioneering neuralink device that could make mental illness a thing of the past. Agnes, played by Jennifer Lim, is the mastermind behind it all.
We follow Charlie during his trial. He has been dogged by depression for years and is running out of options, getting boosted up the waiting list by his friend Lucia (played by a charming Lorraine Yu), who is interning at the company. James Jip is strong in his portrayal, showing the ebb and flow of Charlie’s journey from deep despair into manic heights. The drama concerns the efficacy of the implant, a debate of ethics between Lucia and Agnes, and how far Agnes is willing to go in pursuit of innovation.
One absolute highlight of the evening is Daniel York Loh as Felix, an eccentric patient with an inclination for playing dress-up, often goading Jamie into challenging his perceptions of what it means to be successful or content — to be effective as a human. York Loh, despite being on book, is fully fleshed out and present in his physicality. Not only does he provide a much needed levity to the action, he channels the animal humanity lurking within Agnes’ subjects. Agnes meanwhile symbolises the capitalistic and scientific, she’s jaded and often acting as a frosty, logical foil to the characters around her, only being humanised at the eleventh hour — perhaps needing some of that animal humanity.
The work is certainly touching on something pertinent here. In 2021, figures estimated that one in five Americans were on antidepressants. Mental illness is a rising concern among younger generations. It’s also an incredibly profitable situation for the increasingly profit-driven pharmaceutical industry. The Good Device may not necessarily endeavour to be a political, Brechtian piece, but it certainly leaves us contemplating what is integral to being human, and whether one should be granted the right to change it for the right price. It needs some work in terms of maintaining dramatic tension, and perhaps a rejigging of a Hallmark ending that oversimplifies the consequence of playing god. That being said, it remains a promising work from a promising writer.