The Effect

by Lucy Prebble

Overview

Nominated for Best Revival at the Olivier Awards 2024

Who I am
Is not
A side effect.

Hearts and minds racing, Connie and Tristan are falling for each other fast. But is their sudden and intoxicating chemistry real, or a side effect of a new antidepressant?

As two young volunteers in a clinical drug trial, their illicit romance poses startling dilemmas for the supervising doctors.

Lucy Prebble's funny and intimate examination of love and ethics originally premiered in 2012, becoming an instant modern classic. This edition revised and updated edition is published to coincide with the production at the National Theatre, in August 2023.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781350439719
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Publishing
Publication date:	08/22/2023
Series:	Modern Plays
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	88
Sales rank:	894,198
File size:	312 KB

About the Author

Lucy Prebble is a writer for film, television, games and theatre. Lucy is Executive Producer and writer on the BAFTA, GOLDEN GLOBE and EMMY award-winning HBO drama SUCCESSION, for which she has also won a WGA and a PGA Award. She is the writer and co-creator of I HATE SUZIE and I HATE SUZIE TOO which was nominated for five BAFTAs including Best Drama, Best Writer and Best Actress and won her the Royal Television Society Award for Best Writer. It was a huge hit for Sky, topping many major publications' lists for best shows of 2020 in both the UK and the US where it is available on HBOMax. She is also the creator and writer of the TV series SECRET DIARY OF A CALL GIRL(ITV/Showtime), and made a pilot for HBO starring Sarah Silverman.

For theatre, Lucy has written the political and emotional meta-thriller A VERY EXPENSIVE POISON which was a sell-out, five star hit for the Old Vic in 2019 and was Olivier nominated for Best New Play, It won the Critics Circle Award for Best New Play and Best New Production of a Play at the Broadway World Awards. It also won her the Susan Smith Blackburn Award. Before that, THE EFFECT, a study of love and neuroscience, was performed at the National Theatre and also won the Critics' Circle Award for Best New Play. Lucy is the writer of the infamous ENRON, a hugely successful piece about the infamous corporate fraud, which transferred to the West End after sell-out runs at both the Royal Court and Chichester Festival Theatre and then failed on Broadway. Her first play, THE SUGAR SYNDROME (2003) won her the George Devine Award and was performed at the Royal Court.
Lucy Prebble lives in London. Her smash-hit play, Enron, transferred to the West End and Broadway in 2010 after sell out runs at both the Royal Court and Chichester Festival Theatre. In addition to the huge critical acclaim it has received, Enron also won the award for best New Play at the prestigious TMA Theatre Awards, and was shortlisted for the Evening Standard Award 2009. Lucy created the TV series Secret Diary of a Call Girl, starring Billie Piper, which enjoyed three series and was sold to Showtime, the major US channel famed for its daring dramas. Lucy won the prestigious George Devine Award 2004 for her outstanding debut play The Sugar Syndrome in May 2004, followed by the TMA Award for Best New Play in October 2004. She also won the 2004 Critics' Circle Award for Most Promising Playwright. Lucy was also nominated for the Most Promising Newcomer Award at the Olivier Awards 2004, shortlisted for the Susan Smith Blackburn Award 2003 and nominated for the prestigious Evening Standard Charles Wintour Most Promising Playwright Award 2003.

Table of Contents

CHRONOLOGY

COMMENTARY
Context
Depression and Dopamine
Anti-depressant Medications
Drug Trials
Other Plays by Lucy Prebble
Themes
Is This Love Real?
Can We Trust Our Feelings?
Other Artists
Chemistry
Religious vs Materialist Views
Laboratory vs Real World
In Production
Casting & the Implications of Writing for Particular Actors
Critical Response

PLAY TEXT

NOTES

Editorial Reviews

A palpably intelligent [play] that proves ... that Prebble is one of the long line of dramatists who view medical practice with a rational scepticism.” —Guardian

“What makes The Effect so special is that as well as being a play of ideas, it is also deeply moving, both in its depiction of the giddy wonder of love, and also in its account of the terrifying wasteland of depression itself.” —Daily Telegraph

From the Publisher

This is a knotty drama, dealing with scientific objectivity, guilt, the mysteries of the human heart and brain and what makes us who we are, wrapped up in a deceptively simple and constantly entertaining package.

Guardian

Lucy Prebble's absorbing drama, a hit . . . Taut, intelligent

The Times

The Effect is a headlong delve into the mysteries of the human brain. And Prebble pulls it off with assurance, tickling our cerebellums in the first half, before tugging on our heartstrings in the second . . . heartbreaking . . . [it has] a heart as well as a brain.

Time Out

Incisive dialogue . . . Prebble really researches and the range of her subjects suggests she will have a long theatrical life

Observer

Prebble has written a profound and stirring play. The material is complex but always accessible, the drama serious and informative yet deeply human, with the odd jolt of piercing humour. The Effect confirms her as one of the most intelligent voices in British theatre.

Evening Standard

After her hit with Enron, Lucy Prebble turns to medicine and the mind - to great effect ... The Effect is a four-hander that hopscotches confidently across themes of neurology, psychopharmacology, depression, love and guilt . . . The Effect moves you to thought, sometimes to strong feeling.

Sunday Times

This four-hander brings the author's agile wit, intellectual penetration and a fresh, deeply affecting empathy to bear on a fundamentally much more complex topic than finance: brain chemistry and what it can - and cannot - tell us about the causes of severe depression and the experience of being in love … This is a provocative and challenging play … it ends in edgy gesture of good sense that made me feel like cheering.

Independent

Lucy Prebble's follow-up to Enron is a scintillating exploration of the clash between scientific advance and human impulse … it demonstrates the same vivid, provocative intelligence

Financial Times

Lucy Prebble is a playwright blessed with an exceptionally fine mind . . . the play struck me as being both wise and sane, raising more questions than it answers, to be sure, but that seems a sign of integrity in a work dealing with such a complex subject. But what makes The Effect so special, is that as well as being a play of ideas, it is also deeply moving, both in its depiction of the giddy wonder of love, and also in its account of the terrifying wasteland of depression itself . . . The Effect is an astonishingly rich and rewarding play, as intelligent as it is deeply felt.

Daily Telegraph