A PLAY set in a fictional Chingford care home will examine the lives of older people and issues including mental illness.
Writer Seiriol Davies and lead actress Jools Voce researched Moon River, which is set to open in London later this month, by visiting a care home in Chingford and talking to the inhabitants.
The pair found many touching stories and quirky characters in Chingford and other places including a dance club in Hackney which found their way into the play's own home, Silver Street Centre.
The experience also helped them tackle what they see as one of society's last taboos, mental illness.
Davies's script tells the story of 87-year-old Glad, who moves out of her own house and into Silver Street, where she struggles to come to terms with a smaller world where issues such as who gets their tea last become all-important.
The play also attempts to mirror Glad's own state of mind as she battles with an impending and unspecified mental illness, and ranges from sitcom-esque jokes as we observe life in the home to frightening dreamscapes playing out inside Glad's head.
Davies, 29, said: "Everything about this project challenged my pre-conceptions. The play's approaching old age and mental illness from a very different angle.
"When your whole world is in one room it really does matter who gets the tea last or who’s not doing the bingo calls right.
“Later, when Glad’s confronted with the fact her mind isn’t entirely what she thought it was she rages against it.
“Hopefully it will make people confront mental illness a bit more. It’s very easy for people to dismiss it for what it looks like so we wanted them to experience it for themselves.”
Voce, 39, plays the OAP lead and said her own three-week stint as a warden inside a care home helped her get into the role.
“It was interesting for me to look at how we care for the elderly and how people create communities and families when their own relatives are often gone,” she added.
“While we’re alive there’s always new challenges to face and new experiences to have.”
The play opens at the Pleasance Theatre in Islington on May 22, running until June 2. To book tickets and for more details please call the box office on 020 7609 1800.
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