Name Cracked
Provider Sante Theatre company, University of Warwick
Academics and young performers have worked together to produce a piece of theatre that draws on the personal accounts of young people living with psychosis to raise awareness about the condition.
The play – Cracked, written by Olivier Award-winning writer Mike Kenny and funded by the Wellcome Trust – toured in locations across the country throughout September and October.
The play – performed by University of Warwick's Sante Theatre company – was based on interviews with the families and carers of three young people who had experienced an episode of psychosis.
These were carried out by Swaran Singh, a psychiatrist at the university's medical school.
Singh emphasises the important role carers have, because sufferers are often unable to recognise their own "strange behaviour", he says.
"Someone having a psychotic episode for the first time may need someone else close to them to persuade them to visit their GP to get help.
"The best thing that can happen to a young person is that there is someone else spotting symptoms."
Psychosis is the term used to describe someone who has lost touch with reality, and can include symptoms such as delusions, hallucinations and emotional apathy.
The Royal College of Psychiatrists says psychosis in young people is "usually more severe and disabling" than mental illness and, according to guidelines from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice), it can "have a profound effect on an individual's judgment and their capacity to understand their situation and consent to specific interventions".
For this reason, a young person's treatment and recovery can be largely dependent on support from those closest to them. It can also be crucial to detecting the illness.
The play focuses on the first stages of psychosis, its early warning signs and the symptoms experienced by sufferers.
It examines the role that culture can play in families from different ethnic and religious backgrounds seeking help for young people suffering with psychosis for the first time. It also covers issues such as bullying and drug misuse.
Director Claudette Bryanston says the play aims to "deepen and widen the debate into a general audience".
She explains that the play is "verbatim theatre" and offers the audience an accurate portrayal of the stories of the three families, laced together.
"The key resources for me were the interviews with people who were described as the carers. They were all relatives to the young people, not health professionals," she adds.
Bryanston worked with a poet, who represented the voices of the carers through poetry.
Meanwhile, the theatre company recruited groups of young people in each place it toured, who performed the poetry through speech and physical theatre.
"It is very much focused on describing the two worlds - the inner voice and the outside world - and losing connection with reality, where a new world is created," says Bryanston.
Highlighting stigma
The Nice guidelines on young people with psychosis also highlight the issue of stigma.
Psychosis, it says, is among "the most stigmatised" mental health problem, and sufferers "are often stereotyped as dangerous and unpredictable".
"The key message is about being able to talk," says Bryanston. "In all three families, there are issues of shame and guilt, trying to normalise psychosis and hide it away. It is a complex situation of trying to understand what is happening, and there is a huge sense of isolation from carers.
"The play aims to help people realise that it's not about feeling guilty or ashamed."
After each performance, the audience could discuss the issues raised in the play with a panel of experts, including community mental health service users, psychiatrists and social workers from the local area.
Isis Media is making a documentary about how the project came together, which will feature interviews with the play's writer and the theatre team. It is also making a short video on psychosis. They will be available via the Sante Theatre website by the end of the year.
