A New Play: The Guinea Pig Club
At the end of last year her first
play entitled the ‘The Guinea Pig
Club’ about the inspirational story
of former Forest Row resident
Archibald McIndoe and his Guinea
Pigs ran for a time at the York
Theatre Royal to rave reviews.
We are very lucky to be able to
bring you the background of
this production, written for the
Ashdown Forest Living by Susan
Watkins:
Some thirty years ago my
husband introduced me to Guinea
Pig Sandy Sauders. After just a
few minutes conversation I
knew that Sandy was someone
quite extraordinary - and it
had nothing to do with his
appearance; I persuaded him to
tell me his history. I learned that,
as a savagely burned airman, he
had attempted suicide - twice.
Then he met McIndoe - who
not only repaired his face, but
repaired his soul; McIndoe even
inspired Sandy to become a
doctor. This was a story that
had to be conveyed to a wide
audience. Unfortunately, my
book commitments meant that
I couldn’t give it the attention
it deserved until 2005. Sandy
then introduced me to the
surviving Guinea Pigs in the UK
and Canada, and after two years
of interviews, not only GPs but
also wounded veterens from
recent conflicts; civilian burns
patients; medical, surgical, and
psychological research and
another year spent writing, I had
completed a screenplay entitled
‘The Guinea Pig Club.’ It was then
suggested that as the subject
22 • May 2013 • Ashdown Forest Living
was ‘sensitive’ it might be best to
begin with a play. After another
year of writing I had a stage play
by the same title but the focus
was from McIndoe’s point of view,
whereas the screenplay is the
burnt pilot’s story.
It takes a lot of research to find the
nugget upon which everything
turns - it’s an organic process,
and hugely fascinating when
it finally wriggles its way to the
surface. With McIndoe, the critical
moment occurred during the
winter of 1929-30, when he had
arrived in London expecting a
professorship in surgery. It didn’t
happen, his foreign medical
credentials were worthless in the
UK; And the Great Depression
was on; And he had to support
a pregnant wife and young
daughter. The glittering, young
abdominal surgeon - from the
world famous Mayo Clinic - had
become a down-and-out nobody.
It must be remembered that
in those days abdominal
surgery was the high-risk, aweinspiring specialty that brain
surgery is today - quite a tumble.
At his lowest moment, McIndoe
recalled coming out of the subway
at Piccadilly and seeing disabled
vets begging; playing cornets to
the uncaring; and trying to sell
pathetic little boxes of matches.
They were the disenfranchised,
sidelined from society. The
hopeless McIndoe felt he had
become one of them…it was his
worst moment - and the best for
his future Guinea Pig patients.
There was only one person
McIndoe would turn to in a crisis,
his mother. She suggested he
contact a distant cousin, Sir Harold
Gillies, a plastic surgeon. Gillies
had never heard of McIndoe but
felt obliged to help a fellow Kiwi.
He got him work in various
[email protected] • tel: 01342 300152
© Karl Andre, courtesy of York Theatre Royal
Susan Watkins is a respected
historical biographer. Her late
husband Professor Sid Watkins
revolutionised medical care at
Grands Prix and both were great
friends of Bernie Ecclestone’s
which lead Susan to write the
biography, ‘Bernie’.
Gillies invited him to join his
Harley Street practice and
the aristocrats and starlets,
who comprised much of the
patient list, were soon requesting
McIndoe. However, I should
say that they also performed
surgery for cleft palate, jaw
reconstructions, burns, and
repairing/creating a vagina.
Medical students would joke
about ‘McIndoe’s vagina’. But
McIndoe, as you probably
know, became famous for
the ‘McIndoe nose’. His wife,
Adonia, disapproved of what she
saw as the former abdominal
surgeon’s professional comedown: she didn’t want a ‘cosmetic
24 • May 2013 • Ashdown Forest Living
surgeon’ in the family. Yet, by
the time war broke out in 1939
- only nine years after that winter
of hopelessness - McIndoe
had become one of the most
successful surgeons in London;
he was even planning an early
retirement in ten years time. His
determination had been ferocious
in distancing himself from the
begging vets on a Piccadilly
street corner. But he would soon
encounter the hopeless again
- hundreds of them. And his
determination would be just as
ferocious in helping them recover
a meaningful, successful future.
At the same time he would finally
achieve his own redemption.
One of the joys of this project has
been the spreading of McIndoe’s
philosophy, which we hope will
impact on the lives of modern
warriors as well as civilian patients. Since the York production I have
had letters from several nurses and
surgeons, saying the play has caused
them to re-think the way they
handle patients on busy NHS wards
- this is a bonus I hadn’t anticipated.
The play is dedicated to my
late husband, Prof. Sid Watkins,
who, like McIndoe, was a brilliant
intuitive surgeon, a maverick
- and a great humanitarian. And
marvelous fun.
McIndoe’s daughter, the late
Vanora Marland, had insisted
that I tell the story of her father
treating ‘the whole man’. I had
already made up my mind to do
just that, for that is the story of
the Guinea Pigs, coupled with
the environment he created on
the ward, wherein they could
help each other, something like a
support group.
My friend Sandy Saunders, at
ninety, is still working, seeing
patients, inspiring others - when
he isn’t off on exotic jaunts around
the world.
Getting the play onto the stage
[email protected] • tel: 01342 300152
© Karl Andre, courtesy of York Theatre Royal
© Karl Andre, courtesy of York Theatre Royal
hospitals doing all sorts of nonsurgical tasks, while evenings
were spent studying to obtain
his UK surgical qualifications.
The searing image of the
hopeless vets kept him hard at
it. McIndoe passed his exams
at the first attempt, which was
rare for anyone, but all the more
interesting because his early school
reports show that he was only a
fair student, his best subjects were
French and Geography. Gillies
then began to teach him plastic
surgery. Mcindoe copied the
master and practiced, practiced,
practiced, practiced till he had
varicose veins.
is a long process involving
workshops and rewrites, and
endless calls to theatres. We
began with a Rehearsed Reading
directed by Helen Eastman and
produced by Eleanor Lloyd at
Trafalgar I in the West End. Two
years later we were able to
interest the York Theatre Royal,
where the production, directed
by Damian Cruden, opened
last autumn. The reviews were
amazing - including a 5-star rating
in the Telegraph. Having had such
marvelous reviews it is now much
easier to get the play on in the
West End, where we hope to open
in the autumn of this year. At the
same time we’re gently moving
ahead with the film.