George Bernard Shaw's play is an
interesting choice to put on at the moment, as the economics of healthcare are
probably under closer scrutiny than they have been for nearly 70 years.
However, the NT – mercifully – isn't
pressing as hard to make The Doctor's Dilemma as contemporary as its
current production of Timon of Athens, even though it involves medics
having to decide which lives are worth saving when demand for treatment
outstrips resources.
The doctor in the title is Sir Colenso
Ridgeon (Aden Gillett), whose cure for tuberculosis has propelled him to the
top of his profession.
And his dilemma? With only one place
remaining for his treatment, Sir Colenso must decide whether to give it to an
ailing but brilliant young artist, Dubedat (Tom Burke), or a kind but poor
fellow doctor, Blenkinsop (Derek Hutchison).
He decides that Dubedat's youth and talent make
him the winner, but things become complicated when the doctor meets the artist,
who turns out to be not only an amoral and opportunistic scrounger but also a
bigamist.
And there's more: Ridgeon develops the hots
for Dubedat's (second) wife, Jennifer (Genevieve O'Reilly, Episodes),
and begins to consider the possibility of marrying her were Dubedat – by some
terrible event – to die.
The gaggle of eminent doctors in Ridgeon's
circle each cling to their own dogmatic approach to treatment with a
white-knuckle grip, putting financial gain and reputation ahead of any genuine
care for their patients customers.
In their blank-eyed self-belief and
arrogant disregard for the 'little people', they anticipate one of Shaw's later
and more widely known characters: Henry Higgins in Pygmalion.
As one of the plays most quotable lines has
it, medicine "isn't a profession, it's a conspiracy" – a charge that
Shaw levelled at all the professions, which he saw as working for their own benefit
and against the public interest.
The cast brings the cabal to life with
gusto – especially Robert Portal as the dapper Mr Cutler Walpole and Malcolm
Sinclair as the obsequious Sir Ralph Bloomfield Bonnington, eager to flaunt his
royal credentials but ready to play 'clinical roulette' with his patients'
lives.
A special mention should also go to
designer Peter McKintosh, who makes the most of the Lyttleton stage and even
won a ripple of applause during one scene transition.
The production requires moderate powers of
endurance (2 hours and 50 minutes at the preview we attended), but it's
incisive, entertaining and another powerful reminder of why we'll miss the NHS
when it's gone.
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