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Regional secretary with the National Education Union
Hoard, Arcola Theatre London
Warm-hearted comedy about the relationship between an eccentric mother and her daughters
Anxious siblings: Kemi Durosinmi and Elizabeth Ita in Hoard [Lidia Crisafulli]

IN BIM Adewunmi’s Hoard, two twenty-something sisters of Nigerian descent invite their third and  youngest sister for a meal at their smart east London flat. Chiefly, they want to run their eye over her new American boyfriend.

He makes a favourable impression and the sisters approve. But the unexpected arrival of their combative, larger-than-life mother Wura throws a major spanner in the works of the get-together.

Until now, the anxious siblings have kept the boyfriend secret from Wura and her tornado-like appearance proves to be the catalyst for a long suppressed argument — not just about her overweening influence but her increasingly eccentric and decidedly non-smart living arrangements, about which the daughters are habitually embarrassed in front of potential suitors.

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