The date: Sept 3, 1939. The place: London. The characters: Chronicles of Narnia author C.S. Lewis and Viennese psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud. The topics: God, suffering, and death — mixed with laugh-out-loud humor and genuine honesty.
Lamb’s Players Theatre’s newest production premiered on Friday to a receptive and enthusiastic audience. The script for the play was originally inspired by a Harvard professor’s lecture series in 1967 about Freud, but, after pressure from his students, he included the religious perspective of C.S. Lewis as well. The lecture series went on to become a book, PBS television program, and, in 2010, an off-Broadway play by Mark St. Germain.
Under the smooth direction of Deborah Gilmour Smyth, the Lamb’s production of “Freud’s Last Session” is exquisitely brought to life by actors Fran Gercke and Robert Smythe.
The two-man play runs 85 minutes on one set, which is Freud’s warm and inviting study. Freud has invited C.S. Lewis to come by for a chat, and Lewis rushes in amid news on the radio that Britain has declared war on Germany. It appears as though the world is ending (again), and the two intellectual giants are pensive. Their conversation is punctuated by air raid sirens, radio news broadcasts, and their own gas mask jokes.
The play, of course, presents two starkly opposing worldviews, and each member of the audience wonders which will win: Christianity or atheism? Theater-goers need not worry, as both perspectives are skillfully represented, and ultimately those arguments fall away as the characters reveal their weaknesses and thus their commonalities. Incidentally, Freud is also dying of oral cancer, and the play is set just a few weeks before his death.
“What were we thinking?” says Lewis thoughtfully towards the end of the play, “To solve the greatest mystery of the universe in one morning?”
“The greater madness,” Freud replies, “is to not think of it at all.”
Come ponder with Freud and Lewis at the Lamb’s Players Theatre:
Where: 1142 Orange Avenue, Coronado, CA 92118
When: April 10 – May 17
Tuesday – Thursday at 7:30pm
Friday and Saturday at 8:00pm
Wednesday matinee at 2:00pm
Saturday matinee at 4:00pm
Sunday matinee at 2:00pm
Tickets: Ticket range: $22-64 / Discounts for Youth 5-18 & Active Military
Phone: (619) 437-6000
Online: http://www.lambsplayers.org/
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Becca Garber
Staff Writer
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