In a production commissioned by the Finborough Theatre, the European premiere of American playwright Bruce Graham’s White Guy on the Bus opens at the Finborough Theatre for a four-week limited season on Tuesday, 27 March 2018.
The cast comprises: Marina Bye, Samantha Coughlan, Donald Sage Mackay, Joanna McGibbon and Carl Stone
Ray and Roz are a white, liberal couple living in the safe, staid suburbs of Philadelphia. He is a financial consultant who makes “rich people richer”. She is a passionate teacher who commutes every day to educate the mainly black students of an inner-city school.
On the face of it, life runs smoothly. But Ray seems to hanker after change. He leaves his Mercedes in the drive, and takes to riding the public bus through the African-American neighbourhoods of the city – the only white guy on the bus.
Ray becomes a regular on the same route as Shatique – a young, black single mother who is studying to become a nurse, and determined to make a different life for her 9-year-old son. They strike up a relationship. But what does Ray really want from Shatique?
Bruce Graham’s excoriating and shocking play blows open the racial fault-lines of Trump’s America. With an all too familiar resonance here in the UK, it questions us all – what deals are we willing to make, and with which devils?
