Suzie Miller’s play CARESS/ACHE, the  current production at the Stables theatre, is a very special night at the theatre.

To ID it for you, Miller’s work features inter-weaving stories in the tradition of works like the late Robert Altman’s film, SHORT CUTS. A central ‘umbrella’ theme runs through all the stories; the power of affection, of touch, of connection.

Miller fills the play with some very big journeys which fully Involve the audience. Here are just a few of these stories:-

There’s the pediatric surgeon who loses a baby in the operating theatre, and his world and his relationship  with his wife start to fall apart.

The young literary couple whose world is torn apart when an infidelity of a very salubrious kind has been discovered. The guy has been bonking his partner’s boss.

A mother whose son  is on death row in Singapore and in a desperate state, trying to save his fate and to spend as much time as she can with him.

In the bridges between scenes surtitles flash on the ‘screen’ walls expressing different tangents to the central theme.

The performances that the cast of five give are exemplary:- Ian Stenlake, Helen Christinson, Sabryna Te’o, Gary Clementson and Zoe Carides.

Anthony Skuse’s direction is clear and very fluid. He has so many strong, well written scenes to work with. The play even includes some  light relief with a very funny scene played out between Carides and Te’o.

His creative team support him well,- a great score by Nate Edmonson, Matthew Marshall’s lighting design is sharp, and Sophie Fletcher’s compact set work well.

CARESS/ACHE comes together so exquisitely in the play’s delicate, heartbreaking final scene, where Miller so effectively brings things all together and leaves us in no doubt about what she has come to say.

Highly recommended, CARESS/ACHE plays the SBW Stables Theatre, 10 Nimrod Street, Kings Cross until Saturday 11th April.