Sweet Dreams Mr. Heroin is a hard sell. The play consists of two separate pieces performed alongside each other, one showing drug abuse in the eyes of a distraught and helpless parent (Mr. Heroin), the other from the point of view of an addict (Sweet Dreams). Light entertainment it is not, but then such ‘difficult’ pieces as these hold the promise of something more lasting than a giggle from your theatrical experience.
There are undoubtedly some interesting moments to be found here. Addict Paula’s careful efforts to make herself up for her daughter’s communion are then mirrored in the care with which she assembles strap, spoon and syringe. The father of drug addict Joey describes “scumbags” in a court room, before realising that this is how his child is viewed. However, these moments only happen in the rare instances when the play takes its foot off the tortured victim pedal. The many moments of suffering are overwrought and clumsy; what could have been a visually striking and affecting moment of Paula writhing in her bed was extended for far too long, vomiting was clearly mimed, damaging our investment in the character’s pain.
This is theatre with a cause, and like so many other productions thus inclined, it prioritises a hammering of its message into the audience over its obligation to entertain and engage. Writer, director and performer Sean Ronan is clearly passionate about the plight of those affected by drug abuse, but in using this project as a vehicle for discussing the issue, he is striving for an end without paying enough attention to the means. The views of his father character are delivered out to the audience without any attempt at theatricality, save for an occasional embodiment of another character. When this takes place it is sloppy and distracting; some characters have strong physicalities, others don’t, accents do not remain consistent, and worst of all these brief embodiments seem to unintentionally perpetuate the very stereotypes the play is supposedly challenging (all upstanding respectable characters, ridiculously, have upper class English accents, and Joey is a twitching strung out zombie, the type of caricature that seems intended for ridicule rather than empathy). Overall what we are presented with is a point of view – discussion rather than action, concepts rather than conflict.
While Mr. Heroin suffers from heavy-handedness, there is certainly unfulfilled potential within the second piece, Sweet Dreams. We are given some much needed comic relief during Paula’s phone call to the ESB, and her encounters with her family and landlord (mediated by a phone line and a closed door respectively) allow more nuance and detail surrounding Paula’s character to emerge. We see the two performers interact when Sean Ronan plays drug dealer/pimp Leo. This encounter injects the play with some much needed urgency and conflict, but unfortunately brings with it its own disappointments. There is an overuse of violence, which, in it’s abundance, loses it’s power to contain suspense, and Hollywood cliché is abound with such pleas as “I’ll get you your money OK!”
Had Sweet Dreams Mr. Heroin focused simply on telling a compelling story, and given the implied issue space to breathe, more interesting revelations would have had the potential to emerge in the minds of the audience, rather than simplistic ones being forced into their laps.
Doireann O’Byrne
Sweet Dreams Mr. Heroin runs until the 25th of February
