This Might Hurt: Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough

JOHN Godber’s plays are regularly performed in Scarborough – as well as just about everywhere else in the world: he is the most performed playwright after Shakespeare and Ayckbourn. Generally something of a "marmite" author, this latest offering might be the one to unite the audience as he shines a spotlight on the modern health service, following personal experience in Hull and Wakefield last year.

Over two acts on the simplest of sets we follow Jack (Robert Angell) through the turmoil of his own health problems and then those of his beloved but cantankerous Aunt Betty, as their lives hang in a precarious balance controlled by the NHS. Rachael Abbey and Josie Morley fluently fulfil myriad additional roles.

The play was written, Godber explains, because writing plays is what he does; otherwise, he might have sent a letter of complaint.

The result is an eclectic mix of direct audience address and dialogue, both of which slip in and out of comedy, tragedy and verse. We flinch with recognition at doctors who can’t communicate, nurses who don’t actually nurse, and carers who don’t – or can’t – care.

It’s not all damning: Hull Royal Infirmary and Castle Hill are praised for their treatment (actually of Godber himself). Pinderfields, however, does not fare so well, as we witness Betty’s entirely unsatisfactory "care pathway".

* Runs until Saturday, November 19. Tickets: £10 to £24.50 (£5 tickets for under-26s are available). Box Office: 01723-370541 or sjt.uk.com

Gilly Collinson