PERSONAS, LUGARES Y COSAS

Emma is an actress. She is on stage, playing the leading role in *The Seagull*. “I should be killed,” she says. Because that’s what the text says, but also because she means it. And moments later, she collapses. Emma, Nina and everything else. That is where her journey towards recovery begins. That is where *People, Places and Things* begins.

The days spent in the rehabilitation clinic, alongside a group of professionals and patients, provide the setting in which Duncan Macmillan unfolds this journey into the heart of trauma, in search of healing the wound. How do you return to being here after wanting so badly to leave? The play offers no certainties, but it does sustain one action throughout: listening. Listening to others, stopping looking at oneself for a while. And in doing so, seeing oneself more clearly. Realising that you are part of a group that knows as much about pleasure as it does about suffering. “I’m here. You’re here. We’re here,” says Emma. And some of the pain eases in the comfort of nearness. In *People, Places and Things*, Duncan Macmillan follows Emma’s days in rehab alongside a group of patients dealing with problematic substance use. The play does not seek to preach about any issue, but rather to put on stage — with lucidity, humour and tenderness — the complexity, absurdity and wonder of being alive.

This performance contains strobe lighting effects.