One in two people will develop some form of cancer during their lifetime and go on a journey that is as individual as they themselves are, but what they will all have in common is a degree of trauma and uncertainty, and an element of accommodation.
All this is captured in At Least I’m Not Bald. In this solo show, UK-based Ukrainian writer and performer Valery Reva uses her experience of cancer, together with the testimonies of other cancer patients, to explore the emotional impact such getting a diagnosis.
Visiting family in Ukraine, she goes for an annual medical check-up to be told she has a tumour. As she faces surgery, the comedy of how she will break the news to her family and friends is counterbalanced by her fear of the procedure’s possible outcomes.
The central story is interspersed with song, rap-like couplets and storytelling. A maelstrom of emotions plays out in phantasmagorical episodes where myth and actuality converge, whilst at the hospital, scenes of mundanity are punctuated by breath-catching, tiny detail: the child on the ward with no eyelashes, the ill and dying waiting out the air raid in the hospital shelter when the sirens sound in the night.
The play’s episodes do not all work equally well. The device of hair as an expression of a person’s identity doesn’t quite come off, and the metaphor of cancer cells as wickedly villainous sprites works only to a point, so when Reva asks "am I dying?", it feels almost more metaphysical than fateful, failing to convey a true sense of peril.
Although director Kapil Redekar could cut through some of the wooliness to good effect, At Least I’m Not Bald remains understatedly touching and a pressing reminder to live to the full, because no one know what their future holds.
At Least I’m Not Bald is part of SE Fest, a new festival based in south east London to promote and celebrate new writing co-hosted by two award-winning theatres, The Bridge House Theatre in Penge and The Jack Studio Theatre in Crofton Park. SE Fest 2024 runs until 14 September.