GOD, THE DEVIL AND ME
Lion and Unicorn Theatre
★★★
“a well-crafted, albeit short, production that takes us right into the heart of a delusional disorder”
A first full-length piece written and directed by Fionnuala Donnelly, God, the Devil and Me explores the lived experience of a teenager suffering from psychosis. Told with wit, humour and sympathy, it has been drawn from real life and so is an important work. Anyone who wants to understand a bit more about the condition – especially if they have a family member in a similar position – could benefit from seeing this.
The play opens with a friendly Devil, acted by Campbell Maddox, hanging around waiting for a grumpy God (Neo Jelfs) and Gabe (Noah Edmondson), a seemingly ordinary adolescent, to arrive. Gabe is their latest ‘subject’ – or, put another way, victim and they are about to disturb him, his studies, his thoughts and his relationships. But Gabe is not weak. He engages in real exchanges about life and religion with these ‘friends’, fights back when he thinks they are in the wrong and demands time to himself.
Over 70 minutes, we see the progress of his symptoms, the effect on those around him, and his treatment. A good cast plays this out. Writer Donnelly also performs, very believably, as his mother struggling to understand, relate and find solutions. Gabe’s friend Sam is played with great charm by Miranda McEwen. Maisie Lee Mead is Hannah – a girl he meets in rehab who is struggling with bulimia. She gives us a small and credible insight into this disorder too. With a nice twist, the Devil doubles as bland Dr Blaine while God re-appears as The Nurse.
With the exception of Donnelly, it is a young cast and this tends to show. They are all strong performers and handle well the implicit humour that manifests through the play. Unfortunately they often speak too quickly as if rushing to fit the play into its allotted time. This left me struggling a bit which is a shame, because there are a lot of good things here. Difficult to achieve, the descent into hallucination is revealed with flair and imagination.
The set is simple, as befits a small venue. Some clothes flung around, a gramophone and a pile of LPs ably brings you into a teenager’s private lair. A few chairs represent the other scenes. Black and white costumes adorn God and the Devil (homage to TV’s Good Omens?) who sport magnificent top hats in red and white, giving the show a neat badging.
Overall, this is a well-crafted, albeit short, production that takes us right into the heart of a delusional disorder to witness it from the sufferer’s perspective, an experience which will expand our appreciation of this often misunderstood condition.
GOD, THE DEVIL AND ME
Lion and Unicorn Theatre
Reviewed on 6th January 2026
by Louise Sibley
