How a counsellor turned director is staging a play about love and other drugs

Francis - who grew up in Launceston - is helming IO Performance's latest production in which two young volunteers throw the clinical trial off-course as they succumb to the gravitational pull of attraction.

"I really wanted a show that I could use both my life as a theatre-maker and as a clinician together" Francis said.

"This was basically the perfect combination of that where I feel we can have these really hard discussions with regards to mental health in an audience-friendly theatre setting.

"As a director it's been really interesting - and I'm getting really nerdy here - to use some of the modelling from when I was a counsellor to help the actors portray what feel like real people."

Penned by Lucy Prebble - known for her writing work on the television giant Succession - The Effect is a "clinical romance" that questions chemistry, neurology, fate and love.

The staging is part of the local theatre company's newest season, one in which its founders, Grace Roberts and Chris Jackson - who are charged with The Effect's lighting - are giving new directors the spotlight, like Francis.

As such Francis' production is hoping to push the 2012 play into new territory with the March staging; she said its naturalist performances - by the four-hander ensemble of Leigh Oswin, Jade Howard, Bryce Shreuder and Sakura Walker - are backed by "immersive visuals".

"We've really tried to create a performance that is not just a play, it's an experience where we've amplified elements of it," Francis said.

Those elements are ambitious, including one of The Effect's biggest draws: a soundscape courtesy of a live deejay responding to the on-stage antics of actors, making every performance "different to the night before".

"We're kind of dissecting what theatre is," Francis said.

The Effect is showing six times at IO Performance from Friday, March 15, ending Saturday, March 23. Tickets are available at the IO Performance website.