And then I realized: He is a robot. Well, not Vickers himself, but his character, Walter. Walter Prime, to be precise. He’s a pixelated version of Marjorie’s husband — as she chooses to remember him. Marjorie (Janis Stevens), 86, has a memory that’s about as reliable as a 1974 Ford sedan, and Walter is there to help her memory improve — or at least, keep it from getting worse. He knows what Marjorie has told him about their lives together, and what memories her daughter Tessa (Jamie Jones) and son-in-law Jon (Steve Garland) choose to share, and he tells Marjorie stories. Oh, and Marjorie’s chosen to remember a much younger version of Walter, which seems creepy until you realize Marjorie isn’t a cougar and Walter’s not real.
And it’s nice, right? My grandmother had Alzheimer’s, and when Tessa expresses frustration at “having to kill him [her father] every week,” I get it. Memory loss is horrible for the person losing memories (because it’s not just one memory disappearing, it’s memories), but it’s worse for those watching it from the outside. This part of Marjorie Prime’s imagined scenario seems a kindness, to fill the Swiss cheese holes in a mother’s memory with only pleasant recollections. How lovely to see Walter Prime give Marjorie’s curated memories back to her. It’s like one of those Alzheimer-friendly villages you read about, where the people think they’re living normal lives because they’re protected from anything that can hurt them, a safe, manufactured reality.
It helps, too, how Vickers builds an AI character who blends programmed compassion with… well, programmed compassion. And Stevens is resplendently tragic as the perpetually bewildered Marjorie, so much so that I found myself thinking more than once, “Gosh, I thought Janis Stevens was much younger than that!” And so off the play marches, and perhaps nowhere other than Florida is this subject matter more relevant. We do aging better than anywhere else, and while, yes, it’s kinda creepy to think of programming your memories of your dead husband into a bot, it also seems an excellent solution.
But that’s when things get weird. Because in the next scene, Marjorie is gone and Marjorie Prime has replaced her. “Prime” can mean “of first importance”, “of the greatest relevance”, first in order (as in, the most primitive) or the “best” time of life (as in “the prime of life”) — and I suspect playwright Jordan Harrison meant “all of the above” when he wrote Marjorie Prime. Marjorie Prime is younger than our initial Marjorie, more alert and possesses her full faculties. One thing — and it’s a small thing, it seems: Memory loss isn’t the reason Tessa has commissioned a mother/bot. Instead, Tessa works through her complicated relationship with her mother via Marjorie Prime, but first she needs to explain her relationship to her mom/bot. Jones turns this scene into not only a frustration with AI and concern for the way humans use it, but also a beautiful psychological exposé of the way the twosome’s relationship evolved.
And then there’s Jon. Garland is masterful as the husband, the son-in-law, the perennial good guy. And his performance builds. At the start of the show, Jon is essentially window-dressing, the guy who placates Tessa and dotes on Marjorie and, on the sly, helps Walter build his memory bank. By the final few scenes, Garland turns in a performance so raw, so real I wept with him.
The exquisite set design by Jerid Fox reinforces the idea of the near-future. Spoiler alert: this version of the future is an IKEA one. The best part of this masterful set is the way Chris Baldwin’s lighting works with its focal point — an abstract wall piece that plays music and also resembles our brain’s connected neurons. When the Primes commit something to memory, the lighting in this piece reflects that, leading me to wonder — as I suspect director Stephanie Gularte intended — if the Primes are tied to the same brain in the home that controls our Apple playlists, Nest thermostats and ADT security systems. And if they are, how long before they can control them?
The temptation here is to tell you about the play’s final two scenes, because each actor shines the most in them, particularly Garland, who gives the performance of — well, not a lifetime, but it’s definitely one I’ll want my Prime to tell me about one day. Know this: These scenes ask questions about what happens when AI enters our reality. Can they construct their own and, if they can, is that a bad thing?
I won’t tell you more. I’ll leave it to you to go to this tremendous show and leave with some memories of your own.
Cathy Salustri is the arts + entertainment editor for Creative Loafing Tampa. Contact her here.
This article appears in Mar 8-15, 2018.
