A Public Kind Of Privacy

1m, 3f

• She - late 20’s, a well educated, middle class, fast rising government minister
• Her - the conscience/younger version of “She”.
• He - any age, conventional, pompous, pedantic, the top civil servant at the ministry.
• Sinead - late 20’s, from Northern Ireland, extrovert, passionate and committed, a former student friend of “She”.

Winner of Best New Play Brighton Festival 2007

A Public Kind of Privacy –The Kings Head Theatre 2007

Time Out: **** A mercilessly perceptive and alarmingly relevant dissection of the compromises made in the name of politics, Dougie Blaxland’s excellent play is done great justice by the performance of the First Draft cast. Following the various moral dilemmas - both professional and personal - of a young and promising government minister, the play considers the struggle public figures face to retain integrity despite their own ambition and in face of pressure from their party and voters. Special mention must go to Rea Johnston for her utterly absorbing and memorable performance as the voice for passion and honesty amongst all the spin and image engineering. Overall, an engaging and impressive show.

British Theatre Guide: This is a compelling and profound piece of theatre that should be compulsory viewing for every politican in the country.

Young hotshot politico ‘She’ (Sarah Pemberton) has just been promoted to high office – Minister of the Ministry – by the unseen, all-powerful ‘Himself’. Guided by the equivocating mephistophelean Whitehall corridor-creeper ‘He’ (David Trevaskis), ‘She’ now has the chance to displace the great leader and be elevated to the status of ‘Herself’. But that – as ‘She’s’ younger, more idealistic self ‘Her’ (Caroline Duffy), who stands at her shoulder throughout, keeps pointing out – would mean abandoning all her long-held beliefs in pursuit of hollow, cynical ambition: cue flashback to ‘She’s’ first meeting with Sinead (played with fierce intensity by Rea Johnston) and the beginning of their illicit affair (‘She’ is girlfriend, then wife, to the unseen ‘MC’), and reflections on the value of saying/appearing to be only what you really mean/are. There are strong echoes of ‘Yes, Minister’ – as well as of ‘1984’, ‘Faustus’ and even ‘Hamlet’ – in Dougie Blaxland’s tightly plotted psychodrama. Unlike Antony Jay and Jonathan Lynn’s Whitehall TV satire, however, ‘A Public Kind of Privacy’ isn’t intended to provoke laughter: there’s nothing funny about the need for compromise, Blaxland seems to be saying, rather sternly. There are fine performances from all members of the cast in Ariella Eshed’s smooth, handsomely designed production with Rea Johnston excelling as Sinead.