This Might Not Be It: illuminating the bureaucratic nightmare of the NHS

The Bush Theatre’s affecting new drama about a mental health unit in dire need of reform has its flaws – but there’s much to admire here

Office life doesn’t tend to get much airtime in the theatre, which is surprising given the potential for sparks to fly when contrasting personalities are forced together in claustrophobic environments. Throw in the quagmire of NHS bureaucracy and a couple of adolescent teenagers in the middle of a mental health crisis and in theory you have all the material you need for a theatrical firecracker.
That you don’t quite get that is not to dismiss Sophia Chetin-Leuner’s new play, which is set in the inpatient admissions office of a Children and Adolescent Mental Health service in London. Angela has ruled this cheerless fiefdom with its strip lighting and pen pots for 30 years, organising appointments with indifferent efficiency and cementing her domination by ensuring her analogue filing system is incomprehensible to everyone but herself. Jay, a puppyish, 19-year-old trainee occupational therapist on a six-month temp job, has other ideas. He is determined to digitise the files that spread like miasma across the desks. When he learns that a traumatised 17-year-old who sees a doctor regularly will have to start all over again by joining the adult waiting list when she turns 18, he is horrified. 
In terms of plot, This Might Not Be It has more holes in it than an old-fashioned hospital blanket. It beggars belief, for instance, that someone sacked from their job would turn up to the Christmas party the following evening. Scenes are bitty and move too quickly. This is a drama in desperate need of more flesh on bones.
But at the same time it’s a joy to see a play driven not by a thesis but by character. Angela, played with a blithe, exacting, weary bathos by Debra Baker, typifies much of the problems that beset our beleaguered NHS. She holds onto her beloved pens and paper because that’s how she’s always run things. She has perfected the art of not appearing to hear each time Jay makes a suggestion of how things could be improved. Her capacity to empathise has been worn away following years of limited resources and overwhelming demand. Her airy jadedness stems from an entrenched belief that the system can’t really help people anyway. She also has a terrific line in understated black humour. When Jay rushes to the window after hearing the sound of screams and smashed glass, she remains unperturbed. “He’ll be alright. See, it’s fine,” she says after sirens tear through the air. 
What’s more, the relationship between her and Denzel Baidoo’s naive, hot headed, increasingly disillusioned Jay is beautifully drawn in Ed Madden’s subtly directed production. Each tentative step they take towards each other is observed with a quiet, touching truth. That both are operating within a system screaming out for reform, that prioritises procedure above need, and where desperate young people are invariably the casualty, merely heightens the frustrations of their friendship. This Might Not Be It is more effective as a story of an odd couple learning how to help each other than as a socio-political drama, but it’s all the more affecting for it. 
Until Mar 7. Tickets: bushtheatre.co.uk; 0208 743 5050.