The Effect

Click here if you liked this article 3

https://www.theatreworks.org.au/2026/the-effect

Date Reviewed: 11/04/2026

The name of this play should make it clearly obvious it's point. What begins as a seemingly inevitable love affair between willing, paid participants in a anti-depressant drug trial spins off into being a discussion about the relationship between drugs and people's psychologies.

I have an odd relationship with Lucy Prebble's work. I have listened to an audio version of her play Enron at work to pass the time and found it to be a reassuring narrative to cling to between sales orders and grinning amiably for customers. I find The Effect to be similar to Enron in Prebble's remarkable ability to relay complex ideas and issues in just a few sentences.

The Effect at St Kilda Theatreworks is everything modern Australian theatre should be. Niche but still open to a wide audience. Bold and questioning but not laborious in detail. The whole piece is superbly held together by a team of actors at the top of their game.

I am not sure who Damon Baudin is exactly. He must be an actor of some kind. What I saw onstage was a person called Tristan pouring their life and soul onto the stage for us.

Emma Choy is also a phenomenal standout in this production. Her remarkable skill at being able to inhabit a character and then change and alter that character to suit the situation is a masterful skill. Bravo.

The show is superb, my only real issue is with Prebble's writing. The show begs for an interval. It moves at a blisteringly fast speed, frantic to pick up and throw issues into your face without giving you a moment to think: 'is this the point of the show'. Prebble seems unable to make up her mind as to what she is trying to say about the commercial pharmaceutical industry.

Was the character's love genuine?

Is any love really genuine?

Is depression an abnormality or a societal malady sweeping the world?

These are colossal questions I feel Prebble toys with and leaves unanswered. Maybe that's the point. I don't know, you would have to see it yourself to make your mind up, it's just one of those things.

The set is masterfully done as well. Dividing the stage in two served a great purpose and didn't feel wasteful or excessive. It divided the supervisors and subjects really well and served as a great point of discussion. Aren't we all supervisors and subjects in some way? To everybody?

Most Melburnians see maybe a show a year, maybe two. I urge you on (written) bended knee. Go see The Effect. It's a bloody good show.

Reviewed by Nicolas Van Der Haar