It’s a question of reasonable doubt

They’re on the jury and they’re angry — cast members of the next Evolution Theatre production are, seated, from left, Julie McPhail, Helen McAneney and Rachel Crawford. Standing, from left, are Hevin Haggard, Dave Henderson, Teddy Grant, Robbie Bloomfield, Paula Hatten, Myles Ashworth, Dave Hall, Alex Raines and Ildil Merlini.Picture supplied

Evolution Theatre founder Dinna Myers is back in the director’s chair — this time working on the popular American play 12 Angry Jurors.

12 Angry Jurors is a play that contemplates the huge responsibility of 12 ordinary people as they consider the guilt or innocence of a young man accused of murder.

This is an adaptation of the original play 12 Angry Men written in 1954 by Reginald Rose which was made into a movie starring Henry Fonda in 1957.

It is about the jury in a New York City murder trial frustrated by a single member whose sceptical caution forces them to be more careful in considering the evidence before jumping to a hasty verdict.

12 Angry Jurors was adapted by Sherman Sergel in 1983 who wanted to modernise it and allow for female jurors.

Sergel created two versions 12 Angry Men and 12 Angry Women which can be mixed up depending on the gender of the cast.

Myers said rehearsals were “coming along beautifully”.

“I have a great cast who are really sinking their teeth into these meaty roles.

“The version Sherman wrote for women had an antiquated vision of how women behave so I didn’t use the 12 angry women script at all,” she says.

“I just used the 12 Angry Men script and changed the pronouns as required. The other script didn’t sit well with me. He has one of the female jurors sitting there crocheting, for example. Is that what women do?”

The murder trial in the play has the death penalty.

“Everybody who sits on a jury thinks they have the capacity to be unbiased. They think they can be fair in their judgement of another person but the truth is that our life experiences create these unconscious biases,” Myers said.

“These are things that on the surface we don’t even recognise as biases but they affect our opinions.

“So this play is very much about drawing out the unconscious bias and seeing how people deal with that as a community and individually,” she said.

A trial with the death penalty requires a unanimous verdict or it has to go back to trial by a new jury.

This means the 12 jurors have to be 100 percent in agreement one way or another .

The drama of the play revolves around the changing perspectives and verdicts of the jurors as they discuss the case.

The play brings up the question of what is reasonable doubt — how do you know when you have a reasonable doubt? It takes courage to stand alone against 11 people who have different views . As the play progresses the jurors go back and forth.

Myers has cast one of the female characters as Muslim which she hopes will reflect issues of religious and cultural bias in our society.

12 Angry Jurors promises to be a thought-provoking piece of theatre which will keep audiences on the edge of their seats as the jurors work towards their final verdict.

■ 12 Angry Jurors, Evolution Theatre, 75 Disraeli Street, May 9-19.