Still Alice
West Yorkshire Playhouse, Leeds

BROUGHT to mainstream attention by the 2014 film starring Julianne Moore, Lisa Genova’s debut novel Still Alice is being staged at West Yorkshire Playhouse as part of Every Third Minute, a festival that investigates what it means to live with dementia.

Christine Mary Dunford’s adaptation is low on theatrical drama or grand gestures as it follows the story of Alice (Sharon Small), a successful linguistics professor who’s diagnosed with early onset dementia. Other than the presence of her inner voice Herself (Ruth Gemmell), the play aims for realism as Alice becomes increasingly confused as she finds herself “living in a mixed-up Dr Seuss world.”

She is the cornerstone of her family, but the relationships with her husband and two children are tested as she goes to work in her dressing gown and gets lost in her own home.

Yet despite being left “sad, angry and scared,” there are positive changes in her social dynamics. She becomes closer to her daughter and starts to appreciate the small things, such as ice cream cones that she never had time for when busy with her career.

As her memory begins to fade, objects are slowly removed from the stage and the crowded kitchen/living room dwindles to just two chairs. This decluttering is an effective device although the curved board for surtitled dates is underused and unnecessary.

Small gives a moving performance throughout, with her movements becoming heavier in tandem with her increasingly unreliable thoughts.

But the sketchy characterisation of other family members means that the play lacks the emotional punch that the subject matter deserves.

Runs until March 3, box office: wyp.org.uk