Reviews of Habibi Funk 031, Kayatibu, and The Good Ones
Latest editorial
A sour taste of the black British experience
MAYER WAKEFIELD recommends an emotionally charged drama on a family caught between two cultures
Disconsolate: Tok Stephen as Alvin with Debra Michaels (Vernice)
[Helen Murray]
SIMON DUFF relishes the cross contamination of Damien Hirst’s greatest hits by street artists from France and the US
In view of the grooming gangs inquiry, SIMON PARSONS feels the relevance of this powerful examination of trauma suffered at Medomsley Youth Detention Centre
JOHN GREEN doubts the motivations of a US war photographer who never questions why, or for whom, she is producing images of imperialist conflict
MARIA DUARTE reviews Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere, Hedda, The Mastermind, and Regretting You
TONY CONWAY welcomes a thrilling and concise history of Hope not Hate, that is also a manual full of tactical advice
PAUL DONOVAN welcomes an inspiring account of living with deafness that has important lessons for the treatment of deaf people in today’s UK
Strange Fruit
Bush Theatre London
FOLLOWING a superb revival of Winsome Pinnock’s Leave Taking last summer, the Bush Theatre continue their Passing the Baton initiative by staging this debut work by Kittitian-British writer Caryl Phillips.
Now better known as a novelist, Phillips was just 21 when Strange Fruit was first produced at the Sheffield Crucible in 1979. For someone of such youth it is a flawed yet remarkable work, as is Nancy Medina’s current production.
As you enter the theatre through the beaded doorway, you encounter Max Johns’s design incorporating all the classic features of a traditional West Indian sitting room — a ceramic pineapple, a stack of records, a portrait of the queen.
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MAYER WAKEFIELD wonders why this 1978 drama merits a revival despite demonstrating that the underlying theme of racism in the UK remains relevant
SIMON PARSONS applauds an insightful state-of-the-nation play that explores the growing class divide in South Africa