The Patriot Act

In one of the darkest moments of the 1950s red scare, lauded playwright Arthur Miller was famously dragged before the Senate’s Un-American Activities Committee and summarily punished for refusing to implicate his friends in "subversive" activities. The Patriot Act takes Miller’s experiences as an inspiration and borrows much from his dramatic style, doing a superb job of updating the tale of an artist struggling to come to terms with oppressive circumstances.

US actor Will Lyman excels as William Carpenter, an elderly playwright whose controversial plays have irked people at the top of a distinctly Bush-style government. Accused of inciting terrorism, Carpenter faces a trip to Guantanamo until a senior White House aide offers him the chance to write an anti-terrorism play for the government in exchange for freedom. Made to chose between compromising his ideals or being unable to ever write again, Carpenter’s mind drifts into the troubled past of his family as he struggles to make a decision.

The Patriot Act is not so much a polemic as it is a mature discussion of modern-day liberty, and it is all the better for it. Robert Pemberton’s smarmy, Southern government official is no one-dimensional antagonist but a man with reasonable arguments and kind mannerisms. Carpenter himself is flawed, extolling civil liberties while also seeking to control the life of his son.

Putting the playwright in the play is never easy to do well, but production company Green Room Presents have created a stunning tribute to the actions and ideas of one of America’s great heroes.