Kazuo Ishiguro’s examination of the human condition in the form of a science fiction novel can be taken in a dozen different ways, including as a metaphor for slavery and exploitation, the unintended consequences of scientific experiment, the evil of death, or even an examination of the meaning of life.
This frightening story follows the short lives of a group of school children into adulthood cloned and educated to provide human organs with the intention of providing better disease free longer lives for future generations.
To say that it is disturbing as we follow the reminiscences of the beautiful in mind and body, Kathy, played with heartrending sincerity by Nell Barlow, as she tries to break out of the doomed life mapped out for her, and live a full life, would be to grossly underestimate the bleak future she faces.
The story develops through Kathy’s relationship with Ruth, Matilda Bailes, her selfish best friend at school, selfish to the extent that she not only steels Kathy’s precious tape of the song Never Let Me Go, but also usurps her boyfriend, the insecure, self doubting Tommy, Angus Imrie.
We move from the warmth of Kathy’s reconciliation with Ruth on her death bed to a chilling confrontation with Tommy by her side, with the now retired teachers Miss Emily, Susan Aderin, and Madame, Emilie Patry, in an attempt to break the cycle of the lives they were bred for.
As the story rolls on to its inevitable ending you begin to wonder how Suzanne Heathcote, who was faced with the mammoth task of adapting Ishiguro’s book for the stage, is going to tie up all the loose ends thrown up by this complex examination of the human state. For those who managed to follow each new twist and turn of the meandering narrative, as Director Christopher Haydon skilfully led his cast through Tom Piper’s cleverly designed multi purpose set, it would be a very fulfilling two hours forty minutes.
Others who found themselves lost amongst the labyrinths of metaphors and inner meanings, will wish that a theatrical genius like John Whiting was still on hand. His adaption of Aldous Huxley’s six hundred paged The Devils of Loudin still haunts this theatre, as a model of how to make the most complex tale clear and exciting for an audience, over half a century after it was presented here.