Graceland
Royal Court Upstairs
 

“HOW did I let this happen?” is the critical line in Ava Wong Davies’s one-woman play, Graceland.  

British Chinese twenty-something Nina (Sabrina Wu) is blaming herself for getting caught in a web of underhand abuse at the hands of a morose, minted poet — who we eventually learn is called Gabriel. Initially disguised as a classic boy-meets-girl scenario, Davies’s steadily unravelling script is a perceptive take on how class, wealth and power manifest themselves in contemporary relationships.

The initial burning sensation of their romance is palpable as we travel with them through drunken dinner parties, frolics in the sea and first meetings with the parents – with a particularly enjoyable scene where they eat in her mum and dad’s restaurant and the class divisions begin to subtly emerge as he describes a childhood visit to Hong Kong.