Medicine & The Same: two plays (NHB Modern Plays)

How long have you been here, John?
– I don't know.
And what brought you here?
– That's difficult to answer.

John Kane is sitting on a hospital gurney, and very shortly a jazz percussionist, two women called Mary, a very old man and a giant lobster will arrive. Then everything will start.

Enda Walsh's new play Medicine is a dark and frequently absurdist work that shatters the boundary between cast and audience. It is a devastatingly funny and moving meditation on how, for decades, we have treated those we call mentally ill.

It was premiered by Landmark Productions and Galway International Arts Festival at the Edinburgh International Festival in August 2021 prior to its opening at the Galway International Arts Festival in September.

Medicine is published here alongside Enda Walsh's 2017 play The Same.