RITA DI SANTO draws attention to a new film that features Ken Loach and Jeremy Corbyn, and their personal experience of media misrepresentation
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Lava, Bush Theatre London
Impassioned exposé of pain and anger wreaked by racism and prejudice
MAGNIFICENT: Ronke Adekoluejo
[Helen Murray]
JULIA TOPPIN recommends Patti Smith’s eloquent memoir that wrestles with the beauty and sorrow of a lifetime
MARJORIE MAYO welcomes an account of family life after Oscar Wilde, a cathartic exercise, written by his grandson
KEN COCKBURN guides us through a survey of Chekov’s early short fiction, and the groundwork it laid for his later masterpieces
ANDY HEDGECOCK revels in a hugely enjoyable but deadly serious examination of the 1930s, that is an indictment of our own era
The bard distills our hellish times into fiery words
MORE of a poetic discourse than a play, Ronke Adekoluejo’s monologue, written by Benedict Lombe, follows a young woman’s often happy but sometimes fraught journey from her birthplace in the Congo to South Africa, Ireland and then England.
Lava begins as an entertaining tale with a generous helping of humour. Yet its end is visceral in its challenging conclusions.
The first half is loosely framed around Adekoluejo’s quest to gain a British passport. But when that theme draws to a somewhat tame, if amusing, conclusion the way is paved for a more intense and deliberately disjointed second half.
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