In Good Faith [Drama]

Drama from BBC Radio 4

A Play For Radio by Mark Lawson

The soft sad silence of a child Intensive Care Unit, broken by the whirs and bleeps of artiff?cial life support. A 30-something woman is leaving the ICU telling a nurse that she needs to be “in court ? and that she is “absolutely sure she just smiled'.

At the High Court, in a legal antechamber, the woman is sitting on the opposite side of the room to a man of similar age. They have a curt and hurt conversation.

Mrs Justice Penley calls the hearing to order. She tells the court that this is an emergency hearing to decide between the claims of the mother and father of a child who is in a PVS (Persistent Vegetative State) as a result of a very rare genetic condition. In this “unusually complex ? case, the couple is bitterly separated so each parent is calling separate and conflicting medical evidence.

Then, there is a dramatic courtroom twist.

As the reconff?gured case comes before Mrs Justice Penley, all those involved discover who is really responsible for the fate of DVP. The play ends, as it began, in the ICU.

MRS JUSTICE PENLEY - Susan Jameson

PHOEBE - Macy Nyman

PEQ (DEBORAH) - Jeany Spark

XZR (ANDREW) - Tayla Kovacevic-Ebong

JYA (CRAIG)/COURT CLERK/NURSE - Tom Glenister

BEA JENKINS KC - Jane Slavin

EMILY LEANING KC - Lizzy McInnerny

Producer/Director: Eoin O'Callaghan

A Big Fish Radio production for BBC Radio 4

A dispute over ending life-support for a brain-stem dead child is set to destroy a family.

Estranged parents fight a bitter legal case over the fate of their catastrophically sick child as a startling piece of new information is brought before the court.