After last year’s hit local debut, The Effect explores love and brain chemistry, at The Cultch October 15 to 25
Rumble Theatre and ITSAZOO coproduction digs into Succession writer Lucy Prebble’s critically acclaimed play as it builds unease along with the dosage
Paige Louter, Andy Kalirai, and Meghan Gardiner in The Effect. Photo by Chelsey Stuyt
The Cultch presents Rumble Theatre and ITSAZOO Productions’ The Effect at the Historic Theatre from October 15 to 25
WHEN THE EFFECT saw its local premiere at the Progress Lab 1422 last year, it sold out—possibly in part because its writer, Britain’s Lucy Prebble, is so well known for the small-screen hit Succession. Now, for those who missed it, a new expanded production of the provocative look at pharmacology and love is ready to hit The Cultch’s Historic Theatre.
In a script The Guardian has called “intense and intoxicating”, The Effect follows Connie and Tristan, who sign up for a clinical trial of a new dopamine-regulating drug. But when they start to form a romantic connection, questions arise about consent and pharmaceutical ethics—and whether they’re even experiencing real feelings or chemically induced ones. Supervising the trial are Dr. Toby Sealey, who believes depression is purely a chemical imbalance, and Dr. Lorna James, a veteran psychiatrist who’s skeptical about over-medicating human emotion.
“None of these characters are without flaws—in fact, they’ve got some pretty big ones front and centre, and she really collides them all to construct some very funny moments that are still quite grounded in reality,” director Jiv Parasram told Stir last year when the show opened. “One of the things I really love about her writing is that we can go from quite large, deep philosophic arguments and flip into really human pettiness. I find that contrast very funny in its relatability. I also feel like it adds a certain authenticity to it all.”
As Stir’s review said when it debuted in 2025: “At its peak, her writing brims with equal measures of dark humour and difficult truth,” but added, “rich with timely themes, this production does not simply rest on the strength of Prebble’s writing, but reimagines its moral quandaries.”
Other selling points? The Effect features a crack team of local actors: Meghan Gardiner, Andy Kalirai, Paige Louter, and Anthony Santiago, all adept at the thriller’s rapid-fire verbal sparring, not to mention some memorable one-liners.
It should be interesting to see how the expanded show integrates light, projections, and sound—which in the premiere echoed not just the characters’ emotional state, but the drugs’ side effects, and a growing sense of unease and danger.
It's well worth catching—even if it may leave you questioning how much brain chemistry has to do with love, and just how interwoven the heart is with the brain. 
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