Dr Hills Casebook - blog 14

The fourteenth instalment of Robert Fairclough’s blog about the Change Minds project which unites history, mental health, creative writing and theatre. 

MY DR HILLS’ CASEBOOK: 14

There are some Zoom meetings it’s a pleasure to log onto, and Dr. Hills’ Casebook is one of them. Along with the Tuesday morning Stay In Touch Gatherings, another online group initiated by the Restoration Trust, the fortnightly Casebook meetings have been instrumental in keeping my pecker up recently.

That’s because we’ve hit a purple patch. Things are approaching critical mass with the play and our book of creative writings, and today we had some news so positive it had facilitator Darren France turning cartwheels of delight (metaphorically speaking): Gail had discovered that Dr. Hills has living relatives, a revelation that Darren quite rightly described as “amazing news.” Richard Johnson was equally impressed, praising it as “a stunning result.” (I didn’t know that Gail was a descendant of one of the patients in the Asylum, either. It’s amazing what these Wednesday mornings can bring you.)

Other energising news was that Julian Claxton, the photographer and filmmaker who’s recording the ‘Dr. Hills’ Casebook’ play for posterity, has been OK’d to put together a ‘making of’ documentary. This’ll trace the path of the project form the initial research in the Norfolk Record Office’s archives to the staging of the play. In the spirit of what a democratic,  ensemble undertaking Dr. Hills’ Casebook is, everyone from Restoration Trust founder Laura Drysdale down to us research foot soldiers will have the chance to be interviewed (in soundbites only if we don’t want to appear on screen).

Following on from the appearance of three of the play’s actors in the Zoom room two weeks ago, this time around Clare Hawes and Ben Elder offered us insights into their roles and performances. Clare had gone as far as making notes, but in the best traditions of lost homework, confessed that “the cat nicked them.” Not to worry: she delivered a quite moving appraisal of her main character, Marianna Spall, a woman who had eleven children and was suddenly faced with an empty nest. In building her interpretation, Clare considered that Marianna may have been going through the menopause, was feeling the loss of her children, subsequently lost her mind and then decided to marry the one stable thing in her life, a tree – “I’m having some of that!” It was fascinating to hear her talk about how she thought Marianna would move, “from the pelvis, in a lumbering, pelvic way.”

Ben observed – and Clare agreed – that her performance improved immeasurably when she “sat still and used the words.” Darren then came in with the comment that, during the rehearsals at The Cut in Halesworth in February, Ben was “a great architect in the room that week.” That’s true; I was there, and Ben certainly played a major part in steering the innovation during rehearsals. It’s fitting in a way, because his character, lay preacher, patient and orderly William ‘Jabez’ Edwards, is the architecture the whole play is built on. Interestingly, Jabez was the first historical person the actors discussed, was picked by the play’s writer Bel Greenwood as a major character, and was the first inhabitant of the Norfolk County Asylum that Richard Johnson researched.

So, the part comes with a fair degree of responsibility. Ben hasn’t approached it lightly, believing that “this is something we have to give respect to,” a commitment that would not generate “an ounce of laziness” from him. In building Jabez’s character, Ben had related Jabez’s life to his own by drawing on his own experiences. Candidly, Ben revealed that, at 35, he has a handful of people he really trusts and, in his head, Dr. Hills is a composite of all of them, with Ben’s Jabez treating that composite figure “as a therapist.” Intriguingly, Ben saw the preacher’s relationship with Dr. Hills as “beautiful but quite overwhelming,” and that, intriguingly, Jabez was “a villain and a hero at the same time.”

I said further up the page that it’s amazing what these Zoom meets can generate; Ben reckoned that ‘Dr. Hills’ Casebook’ alluded to two other plays, namely ‘Our Town’ by Thornton Wilder and ‘Road’ by Jim Cartwright. Intrigued, I looked them up. The former was first performed in 1938, with the main character being the stage manager of the town’s theatre. He directly addresses the audience – like Jabez – and the actor played some of the other roles (like the other four performers do in ‘Dr. Hills’ Casebook). Roll on over 50 years, and 1986’s ‘Road’, first performed at the Royal Court Theatre Upstairs, had the narrator Scullery inviting the audience into various homes in a working class area of Lancashire, at a time of great social deprivation.

As a result of our meeting on 31 March, I now have two plays new to me to watch, either on the TV or, preferably, when the theatres open again. That’s what I love about Dr. Hills’ Casebook: we’re always discovering something new.

And somehow, I think that ‘Dr. Hills’ Casebook’ will be just as good as its two theatrical forerunners.

'Robert Fairclough writes on a variety of subjects, including mental health and popular culture (sometimes both at once). He has written six books, contributes to magazines and websites, and writes regular blogs for The Restoration Trust. He can be contacted on robmay1964@outlook.com, and his website can be viewed at www.robfairclough.co.uk ‘