Connie (Taylor Russell, right) and Tristan (Paapa Essiedu) as patients in a clinical trial for a new antidepressant, in Lucy Prebble’s The Effect.
Lucy Prebble’s The Effect was first staged in 2012, presented at Barrow Street Theatre in the Village in 2016, and then revived at London’s National Theatre in 2023. That revival now comes to the Shed. It is a psychopharmacological love story: Tristan (Paapa Essiedu) and Connie (Taylor Russell) are participants in a clinical trial for a new antidepressant, overseen by Dr. Lorna James (Michele Austin). Tristan is an extroverted working-class Londoner from Hackney with a mix of confidence and self-deprecation, while Connie is a more tightly wound, introverted psychology student whose participation in the study is apparently less about getting paid than about intellectual interest.
Dr. Lorna James (Michele Austin) oversees the drug trial, despite her strong doubts about the “psychopharmacological revolution.” Photographs by Marc Brenner.
Tristan and Connie first flirt while holding urine samples (all props are imaginary), and as they take their daily pills and tease and get to know each other, they fall in love. Or do they? Is their love just a chemically induced dopamine high? But maybe that’s just what love is? On top of these thorny questions, Prebble introduces the possibility that either Tristan or Connie are on a placebo, so their love, post-medication, might not be reciprocal.
The Effect asks big questions—ethical and philosophical—without losing track of the subtleties of its characters’ identities and the immediacy of their situation. There is no narrator telling the audience about the onstage conundrums and what it all means, and there are no debate-club set pieces. The complications and debates arise naturally from the provocative situation and are never less than messily human; Prebble’s sharp-witted but not overdone dialogue allows a splendid cast to flesh out their characters under the sleek, minimalist, and gorgeously precise direction of Jamie Lloyd.
Essiedu makes Tristan’s charm hard to resist without sacrificing the character’s complexity; Russell is outstanding—it’s hard to believe that the 2023 production was her stage debut—as Connie slowly opens up to the possibility before her, but struggles more than Tristan with the shadow that their affection is fueled by a drug. Tristan is such an optimist that he’s able to find the positive in her doubting:
Connie. No I mean. The anti-depressant, the doctor said, they’re designed to stimulate, like dopamine. Which is the rush you get if something exciting happens or, when you—well it’s fake, it’s a chemical that feels like. Like falling for someone. So forgive me if I take everything with a big pinch of, you know…
Tristan. What you think I don’t like you for real cos of the—?
Connie. I think it’s a strong possibility.
Tristan. Bullshit. I can tell the difference between who I am and a side effect.
Connie. With respect, Tristan, no, you definitely can’t.
Tristan. You’re saying any attraction here is cos of the trial.
Connie. Part of it, sure.
Tristan. [Quietly pleased] So you’re feeling a sort of attraction then?
Lorna sits at one end of the rectangular stage, facilitating as Tristan and Connie go through the trial, but also speaking with Dr. Toby Sealey (Kobna Holdbrook-Smith), a former lover of hers and the doctor who hired her for this trial. The two doctors mostly interact from their opposite ends of the stage, digging a bit into their personal history but also wrangling with the trial results in a way not dissimilar to Tristan and Connie. Toby is a drug evangelist who will brook no quibbling with their effectiveness, while Lorna, who gives hints of personal gloominess, is a psychopharmacology skeptic who struggles with bouts of depression, for which she does not medicate. The tug-of-war between Lorna and Toby is compelling and—aside from two short monologues of direct address to the audience on the human brain—refreshingly unpedantic, even as they debate the very questions the audience is meant to be asking.
“The play doesn’t seem keen on the idea of a world where chemistry explains every human mystery, but neither is it naively romantic.”
Tristan and Connie’s scenes take place between those of the two doctors, either immobilized in squares of light or moving nonstop as they chat—one scene, where they have ventured into a nearby, defunct mental hospital, has a balletic feel, which, in combination with their increasingly charged flirtation, makes the experience of falling in love (whether chemically induced or not) dramatically palpable and exhilarating to watch. Terrific lighting design (by Jon Clark) and sound design (by George Dennis) helps propel the story and enhance the suspense.
Prebble wisely avoids an easy answer or clean resolution. The play doesn’t seem keen on the idea of a world where chemistry explains every human mystery, but neither is it naively romantic. Ultimately, The Effect may prompt one to think that “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, / Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”
The Effect runs through March 31 at The Shed’s Griffin Theater (545 W 30th St.). Evening performances are 7 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday; matinees are at 2 p.m. Wednesday, Saturday, and Sunday. Tickets are available by visiting theshed.org.
Playwright: Lucy Prebble
Director: Jamie Lloyd
Sets & Costumes: Soutra Gilmour
Lighting: Jon Clark
Sound Design: George Dennis
Composer: Michael “Mikey J” Asante
