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by Meg Braem, directed by Brenley Charkow

Drayton Entertainment, Hildebrand Schoolhouse Theatre, St. Jacobs

October 23-November 9, 2025

Hank: “What’s the point of ‘safe’?”

Drayton Entertainment is the only theatre company I know of that sets the period of mid-October to mid-November aside to programme a play related to Remembrance Day. This year the selected play is Flight Risk, a play from 2017 by Calgary playwright Meg Braem. Its focus is Hank Dunfield, a 99-year-old World War II veteran who is unhappy living in a nursing home. There are simple and more complex reasons why Hank is unhappy. Braem’s probing of these more complex reasons sets her play apart from typical nursing home dramas. Shaw Festival veteran Peter Millard gives an tremendous performance as Hank, a performance that alone is reason enough to rush to see the play.

At the start of Flight Risk, we learn that Hank has been brought back to the Ponderosa Pine Lodge Seniors Care Centre after three days of going AWOL. Because of that, Hank is deemed a “flight risk” and is given his own room. Nursing supervisor Kathleen has assigned twentysomething nursing student Sarah Baker, who would rather be working in an emergency room, to be his care-giver. Hank and Sarah do not at first hit it off. Hank is angry at everything, especially his lack of privacy, and Sarah, who has private concerns of her own, does not enjoy Hank’s grumpiness.

As one might expect in plays where otherwise good characters take an instant dislike to each other, Hank and Sarah do find common ground. Sarah finds that Hank has abandoned building a scale model of the Lancaster bomber we used to fly in in battle. In helping Hank rebuild the model, Sarah finds out more about Hank’s life and why he resents being in the Lodge so much. In turn, Sarah opens up to Hank about a medical condition she has that she has been trying to hide. It turns out that each is the only one the other can confide in.

The play starts out as a comedy with Hank’s complaints about the Lodge hitting the most expected targets – bad food, staff treating inmates as if they were infants, everyone thinking about the “D- word” but no one ever speaking about it. Kathleen explains to Sarah that Hank is given to “sundowning”, i.e., increased anxiety and agitation that become worse in the late afternoon and evening. Hank’s desire to escape the Lodge becomes particularly strong near dusk. Kathleen knows that sundowning is common feature of dementia. Sarah, however, discovers that it not just some vague fear that overcomes Hank every day but a memory related to a specific incident.

Hank’s deeper complaint with the Lodge administration as personified by Kathleen is its overriding concern for keeping its patients “safe” even when it is no longer to a patient’s benefit. Kathleen forbids Hank his favourite mints because they are a choking hazard and she won’t let him have his favourite pie because it contains too much sugar. Hank and Sarah ask themselves what exactly Kathleen is protecting a 99-year-old from except his small pleasures in life. As Hank says, “What’s the point of ‘safe’?” The greater issue is that the most important time in Hank’s life, when he was at war, was a time when he was anything but safe. He was tail-gunner, part of a crew of seven, flying in a tin can from which all the armour had been removed to make it light enough to carry bombs. He risked his life with every mission. As we come to realize, being “safe” has become the regret that continues to haunt his life.

Director Brenley Charkow has drawn well-considered, naturalistic performances from the entire cast. It is a huge pleasure to see Peter Millard on stage again and in such a major role. Frequent play-goers will know Millard from his 35 seasons at the Shaw Festival. Millard, only 77, believably plays a 99-year-old by avoiding all the clichés one could easily succumb to. Yes, his Hank complains about most of the same things residents of nursing homes complains about, but Millard is a master of intimating multiple layers of a character’s thought. Hank may be irked by minor things, but Millard always makes us aware that these complaints conceal much larger existential complaints. Millard is also a master at delivering Hank’s comic remarks in the driest possible way.

As Sarah, Shauna Thompson is a constant delight. At the beginning, Thompson is willing to let us see Sarah as yet another superficial young person who is displeased with having to care for an unfriendly, crotchety old man. But Thompson can also show that her character has layers and that Sarah is really a fearful, unhappy young woman who is reluctant to let anyone know how she really feels.

What make the play so enjoyable is watching how Millard and Thompson detail the very gradual way in which these two seemingly opposite characters come to realize how much they have in common. It is lovely to see how their roles even reverse with Hank giving Sarah advice on how to live well.

This drawing together of Hank and Sarah stands in contrast to the relations of both with the nursing supervisor Kathleen. Helen Taylor demonstrates that although Kathleen does understand what motivates both Hank and Sraha to a degree, she is so focussed on doing her professional duty that she doesn’t allow herself to be friends with either. For Kathleen, following Lodge protocols is more important that doing what will actually make either Hank or Sarah happier. This includes forging ahead with plans for a birthday party for Hank’s 100th even though he specifically says he doesn’t want one.

Unlike some plays dealing with the elderly, Flight Risk has a palpable ring of truth. A large part of this derives from the fact that in preparing to write the play, Braem interviewed numerous World War II veterans were in nursing homes in Alberta. One, a 90-year-old tail-gunner, experienced the events in real life that Braem has given Hank. In the Foreword to the published edition of the play, Braem wonders in relation to this 90-year-old, “How many people had stories like this? How many of those stories were being heard?” Braem cites a medical study of Canadian Air Force veterans of World War II that began with over 4000 individuals. By 2018, only 137 were still living.

Drayton’s sensitive production of Flight Risk is an insightful commemoration of those men and women who were willing to give their lives for the sake of their country. Now that we are living 80 years after the end of World War II, Braem has done us all as service by giving us a glimpse of what appalling experiences people of the time may have suffered. As we know, ignoring the past is the easiest way to repeat it.

Christopher Hoile

Photo: Peter Millard as Hank and Shauna Thompson as Sarah; Peter Millard as Hank, Helen Taylor as Kathleen and Shauna Thompson as Sarah; Peter Millard as Hank. © 2025 Drayton Entertainment.

For tickets visit: www.draytonentertainment.com.