TEHRAN-The play “Whose Life Is It Anyway?” by Brian Clark is being performed on stage at Divar Art Home in Tehran.

Dorsa Aghaei has directed the 80-minute play that has Shahin Zare’, Yukabed Mousavi, Alireza Sa’adati, Hadiseh Rezaei, Hamid Mehrju, Negin Khosrow, Shayan Heydari, Naghmeh Mon’emi, and Sara Lotfi in the cast among others.

Set in a hospital room, the action revolves around Ken Harrison, a sculptor by profession, who was paralyzed from the neck down (quadriplegia) in a car accident and only his brain functions normally. He is being kept alive by the miracles of medicine but wishes to die.

Clark presents arguments both in favor of and opposing euthanasia and to what extent the government should be allowed to interfere in the life of a private citizen. In portraying Ken as an intelligent man with a useless body, he leaves the audience with conflicting feelings about his desire to end his life.

As he fights for his right to die rather than live in an incapacitated state, the play examines the moral and legal aspects of the situation and the reactions of the hospital staff.

Brian Clark (1932-2021) was a British playwright and screenwriter. He taught in schools, colleges, and universities and was a member of the Drama Department at the University of Hull from 1968 to 1972.

He is best known as the author of the multi-award-winning play “Whose Life Is It Anyway?”, which was first produced in 1978.

In the 1970s, it took Brian Clark six years to find a West-End theater management brave enough to risk presenting a play in which the central character is a tetraplegic faced with a future of total dependence on a life-support machine. But it was a smash hit both here and on Broadway winning several awards, and a film version followed. The dilemma posed by a medical professional committed to saving life on the one hand, and an individual claiming the right to make their own decisions about their life on the other, is one that has struck a chord deep in the public imagination and is as real today as it was then.

“Whose Life Is It Anyway?” will remain on stage at Divar Art Home, located at No. 72, Sepand St., Nejatollahi St.

SS/SAB