"What Could Be Worse Than Jumping?" by

Olly O'regan

Nottingham New Theatre Online.

This is the penultimate piece of work in the NNT's online season and possibly, for me, one of the hardest to watch, although one of the most fascinating to listen to.

A combination of characters inspired by Fyodor Dostoevsky’s 'Demons' and David Foster Wallace’s 'Infinite Jest', the three characters discuss depression and addiction.

Katherine Gompert (Ace Edwards) relates what depression and addiction is to her and what she feels will rid her body of the depression. Katherine is a modern take of the male character, of whom I will come to shortly. She is open with her body language and has a very relaxed aura, as is her language. Her outlook has a more simplistic way of getting rid of her inner ills, offering up sedation and ECT as a remedy to what she feels.

Nikolai Stavrogin (

Charlie Catmur

) comes across as the opposite. His body language is closed and forever seems to be troubled, his hands clenched and wrung with a nervous and often frightened look. He is less animated than Katherine.

The Doctor / Tikhon

Danial Ahmer

flips between the two and while he deals with both forms of script - the Doctor's being easier flowing while Tikhon the Monk's is not written with a natural flow, so if you are used to Shakespeare or Dickens rhythms of script, you will find this of a similar pace. And the differences also make this piece of work such an interesting one.

The characters flip-flop and both offer points of discussion concerning depression and what may be the remedy.

The piece is beautifully filmed in black and white, which adds to the bleakness and the original music complements the cinematography and overall feel.

My only negative, and it's only a little one, is that the sound at times needs enhancing so we can hear the beauty of the script.

Written and directed by Olly O Regan who also co-directs with

Beth White

. Beth also produced the piece.

Barney Hartwill

,

Ellie Harding

and

Jesse Rough

were the Video Editors.

Caption-Writer is Cecillia Alexander, Creative Assistant is Holly West and Publicity Assistant is Abie Whitehead.

What Could Be Worse Than Jumping? can be viewed online from 7.30 tonight via the Nottingham New Theatre site