Is It Time

Martin Ashley Jones' Is It Time is billed as a love story focusing on an elderly couple, Jim and Eva Rogers (Ross Scott and Sylvia White) in crisis. They have lived their lives together, more or less, since they met playing the titular roles in a university production of Romeo And Juliet — a backstory which prompts somewhat extensive (and occasionally excessive) Shakespearean quotation. Nonetheless, the love between them is genuine, and it is clear from their interactions when alone that they treasure each other more than anything else in the world.

Enter Simon Russell (David Luke), Jim's regular doctor, with bad news. Eva's health is declining, and soon Jim may be forced to live in a world without her. Not only this, but their grandchild by their estranged daughter has shown up in a burst of passion and affection to see them through to whatever end. Melancholy, misery and starkly confronting mortality are the order of the play.

Is It Time is intense. Barely two minutes in a scene go by without a character bursting into tears or hearing some tragic piece of news, and the emotional hammer-blows never slow down, leaving no chance to recover. David Luke's sombre, deeply concerned expressions enhance an already unrelentingly serious mood. Nonetheless, the play does attempt to grapple with the very difficult and rarely considered issues of voluntary death and euthanasia, leaving it not so much a love story as an exploration of old age and the right to live.