KNOT HEART - Almeida Theatre

tobacco, prescribed drugs, illegal drugs). Do you know that addiction is a medical illness? Do youthink the media present addiction as an illness? What are some of the stereotypes and prejudicesabout addiction? You might want to read the interview with consultant psychiatrist Dr Owen-BowdenJones on pages 38-43.Practical Exercise: Split the group into smaller groups of five. Ask each group to create three frozenimages that are photographs of a family where one family member has a problem with substanceaddiction. Decide what they are addicted to and show, progressively with each image, the impact thataddiction has on the family. With a more advanced group, extend this exercise by asking them tocreate five images, then ask them to develop short transitional scenes between them. Ask each groupto share their work back with the rest of the group as audience.Evaluate: What are the ways that addiction impacts on emotional (fear, desperation, sadness),physical (passive smoking, alcohol related violence, neglect) or practical (cost) wellbeing? In thescenes, what part did the family have to play in supporting (or not) the addict?Watching the Play: In the play, in addition to Lucy’s heroin addiction, Lucy and Angela smoke, andboth Angela and Barbara drink a lot of wine. Lucy and Barbara’s relationship could be described asco-dependent: at points they use their relationship to define their identity. Ask the group to look outfor these points during the play. When do the characters turn to the substance that they aredependent? How does their dependency affect their relationships - and vice versa?Exercise 5: Family Relationships - Doing the Right ThingIn the play Barbara tries to support Lucy through her drug addiction, at different points she supportsLucy financially and lets her live at home when she is using drugs, allows Lucy to take heroin in thefamily home, and gets heroin for Lucy so that she doesn’t have to meet her dealer. However, she isdesperate to do the right thing for her daughter and believes she has no other option to keep her safe.Duration: 15-20 minutesAim: To encourage students to consider the theme of guilt and its purpose with the context of theplay’s dramatic action.You will need: Multiple copies of the three scenarios (see below) as hand-outs for the group.Practical Exercise: Split the group into threes to create a short scene where trying to support orprotect a family member you care about conflicts with doing the right thing. Share the scenes backwith the rest of the group.Practical ExercisesScenarios:1. In the living room, 3 brothers/sisters: one brother/sister has been accused of stealing alaptop from their college, they already have some minor convictions as a youth offender and ifthey are convicted they will probably go to a youth offender’s institute. They did steal it (topay off a final debt and try to cut ties with a group of people who are bad news). They say thatthey are trying to turn their life around. They are asking their brothers/sisters to cover forthem.2. In the kitchen, 2 parents & 1 child: you suspect that your child was one of a group ofyoung people who vandalised the house of an elderly man, who was so shocked and upset hehad to go to hospital and is quite ill. You think that your child has been bullied at schoolrecently.3. In the bedroom, 3 brothers/sisters: you think that your brother or sister is smoking toomuch weed. When you talk to them about it they say they aren’t smoking too much, and theysmoke because it seems to be the only thing that stops the horrible panic attacks that theyget, and are very embarrassed about.Resource Pack: The Knot of the Heart50