French playwright Florian Zeller’s family drama The Sontransfers onto the West End from The Kiln, London. Translated into English by Christopher Hampton, The Son the final part of Zeller’s trilogy: The Fatherand The Mother. Each dark play demonstrates a tale surrounding mental illness affecting the family, but Zeller claims this is “the only play I’ve ever written in which I knew what I wanted to say from the start, perhaps because it was the only one to be so directly connected to my life” (Capelle, 2019).
The Son, Nicolas (Laurie Kynaston), is experiencing deteriorating mental health after he struggles with the divorce of his parents. He is skipping school, lying, disconnecting from society and claims he is ill but does not know what to do. His mother Anne (Amanda Abbington) cannot cope with his vacant personality and aggression any longer so he decides to move in with his father, Pierre (John Light), his new wife Sophia (Amaka Okafor) and their baby Sacha. This ‘fresh start’ has moments of hope, with bonding sessions through bad dance moves, but it is soon clear that he is only getting worse with time.
