Venue: KXT on Broadway (Ultimo NSW), Feb 26 – Mar 8, 2025
Playwright: Karina Young
Director: Nelson Blake
Cast: Raechyl French, Ben Itaba, Holly Mazzola
Images by Phil Erbacher
Theatre review
Jade is not only battling a terminal illness, she has to fight her husband Pat who plans to create a digital facsimile of her, using the latest in AI technology. As well as the subject of consent, Don’t Save Me by Karina Young explores the ethics around the replication or simulation of a person after death. Although timely, the play is insufficiently imaginative, with a persistent mundanity to its dialogue that makes a fascinating concept seem almost banal.
Direction by Nelson Blake places emphasis on locating the emotional truth of the piece, and little more, resulting in an experience that feels somewhat pedestrian. There is however a great sense of commitment on the stage, with cast members Raechyl French, Ben Itaba and Holly Mazzola, bringing diligence to their interpretations of characters.
Production design by Andrea Knezevic offers efficient solutions that transform the space into a conventional living room. Lights by Topaz Marlay-Cole help render an elegance to the imagery being presented, and sounds by Felix Partos are introduced at key moments to enhance tension.
Don’t Save Me is not quite science fiction, as the circumstance it depicts has already arrived, yet we are still struggling to grapple with that new reality. Technology forges ahead whether we welcome or resist it. We have in the past been able to shape its development, but in this age of tech autocracy, there is little that our democratic will can do.
The billionaires who rule technology are completely impervious to any of our objections. We continue to think that how we spend our money is able to sway their operations, but it is evident that their wealth has become so immense that any reduction in profit we can effect, no longer means anything. Legal recourses have proven ineffectual, even as they are being taken over by a new era of oligarchy. It is only revolution that remains, but it is doubtful if we can awaken soon enough, from this soporific state of our tech-fuelled stupor.
Suzy Goes See 