Transparency asks us to consider, in detail, how to appropriately rehabilitate those who commit terrible crimes as children. Simon, like others and most notably those who murdered James Bulger, on release from prison must live a life under a new identity to protect his future, those around him and his family from his past. Yet in Act One as Simon, in anguish, begs his counselor for permission to tell the truth to his wife, we see his pain and wonder if this process of rehabilitation is the right one.

Simon’s journey through the play is not unlike that of John Proctor in Arthur’s Miller’s classic, The Crucible. For Proctor the prospect of losing his name, of contributing to a fundamental lie is a bridge too far and he chooses death as the preferable alternative. In Transparency, Simon has been forced to live a lie for many years and whilst his truth is one many would not want revealed, his inner torment can still be attributed to the pain of living a kind of rootless, nameless life. In Suzie Miller’s play Simon carries forward the fundamental question posed in The Crucible and, indeed, the hero’s journey in many classics. The question of, who am I ?

At the end of Transparency, as in The Crucible, both characters achieve a sense of being cleansed through adhering, ultimately, to truth. In Arthur Miller’s play we have no doubt that this action was the right thing for Proctor to do; as Elizabeth says, ‘He have his goodness now. God forbid I take it from him!’ However, in Transparency questions remain, leaving the audience in a kind of limbo. We are unsure how his wife, Jessica, will ultimately deal with Simon’s truth and the future for Simon is not easy to see. Yet this ambiguity is one of the plays strengths. Ultimately Suzie Miller asks the audience, at the end of the play, to sit with the dilemma and ask ourselves, what would we do in the same circumstance? Given the contemporary nature of the story this leads to the next question: are we as a responsible society actually attempting to rehabilitate individuals such as Simon or simply condemning them to a life sentence?

Indeed Transparency is a play of questions.

It is also about betrayal and retribution.