The Heretic (play)

The Heretic
Written by	Richard Bean
Characters	3 male, 3 female
Date premiered	2011 Royal Court Theatre in London
Original language	English

The Heretic is a British black comedy play by Richard Bean about climate change and its sceptics. In 2011 it premiered at the Royal Court Theatre receiving positive reviews directed by Jeremy Herrin starring Juliet Stevenson, James Fleet, Lydia Wilson and Johnny Flynn. It made its Australian debut in 2012 at the Melbourne Theatre Company in a production directed by Matt Scholten and starring Noni Hazlehurst, Andrew McFarlane, Anna Samson, Shaun Goss, Lyall Brooks and Katy Warner. The play was published in 2011, and was included in a collection of Bean's plays published in 2013.

University lecturer Dr Diane Cassell's boss and one time lover Professor Kevin Maloney is trying to suppress her recent research into sea levels, as its results contradict the university's conformist stand upon global warming. Kevin, hoping to win a lucrative and high profile research project for the university, pressurises Diane to tone down her controversial lectures, during which she tries to teach the students to reanalyse accepted views over climate change. He also attempts to make her withhold her research findings until the research project decision has been made. Kevin refuses to take the violent threats that Diane has been receiving from Green activists seriously.

Cassell's daughter Phoebe, an erratic anorexic, is there when her mother meets her new student, Ben Shotter, a fervent environmentalist, and the two are immediately attracted to one another. Even though Ben disagrees with Diane's politics he returns to her one on one tutorials in the hope of meeting Phoebe once more. In their lessons Diane teaches him to view science objectively, and not about manipulation of scientific fact. Ben begins to enjoy his lessons and Diane sees potential in him, despite his sometimes irrational and overly emotional outbursts about his estranged family, and his history of self-abuse - to Diane's horror he holds a knife to his wrist during one of their tutorials. He calms down when she agrees to let Ben visit her and her daughter during the Christmas break.

...
Wikipedia