Fierce  directed by George Walker.Black Sheep Theatre and Criminal Girlfriends

Two women damaged by life bond as they reveal their secrets in a therapy session fueled by drugs and alcohol.

Intense, occasionally funny, with fluid dialogue, Fierce might work were it not for the fact that one of the women is a psychiatrist. It is extremely difficult in my opinion,  to buy into the possibility that a qualified professional who has met this patient only once before would crumble so quickly.

Surely she would have mustered her defences over years of overcoming her unsavoury past, more than a decade of academic effort to become a licensed medical specialist and subsequent experience in dealing with manipulative patients?

Despite the fact that both performers deliver strong characterizations, they must surmount the challenge of the contrived situation and the fact that, even though it is turned upside down, audiences are basically eavesdropping on a warped therapy session. …

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Fierce by George F. Walker.  A Black Sheep productions

Gladstone Theatre to Oct. 13

You have to be careful with George F. Walker. The outward trappings of his plays can be so dramatically enticing that they can fool you into thinking you’re watching something good.

This prolific Torontonian knows how to set up a situation bristling with potential. And in the case of his recent play, Fierce, now at the Gladstone, it has to do with a psychiatric session that is driven off the rails by the patient. So yes, the idea is promising.

Walker also has an engaging ear for language, and his writing crackles with the kind of naturalistic dialogue that can seduce us into the world of his plays. It can be argued that playgoers aren’t getting a real world here; rather they are being ushered into Walker’s own restless landscape of the imagination. But no matter — major Walker successes like Zastrozzi, Theatre Of The Film Noir and Nothing Sacred show that it can be a weirdly credible landscape, albeit anchored to its own skewed reality.

But what of the credibility factor when it comes to Fierce? Let it be said  immediately that this Black Sheep two-hander features outstanding  performances from Pandora Topp, as an uptight psychiatrist named Maggie, and Emmelia Gordon as the patient who turns the tables on her. These  two are compelling, but they are nonetheless attempting a salvage operation on problematic dramatic material. …

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