Following its sell-out run at the Jermyn Street Theatre, The Lonely Londoners, based on Sam Selvon’s 1956 acclaimed novel about the Windrush Generation, makes a welcome debut at the Kiln.
Roy Williams has adapted Selvon’s novel into a play which follows the journey of seven young West Indians who have come London with high hopes only to quickly discover that the promised ‘Motherland’ turns out to be an illusion.
They gravitate towards Moses, a Trinidadian known as the ‘fixer’, who has been living in London for 10 years and acts as an advocate for the newly arrived West Indian immigrants.
Williams’ deftly entwines the fibres of Selvon’s sometimes tangent novel into a coherent balance of comedy and pathos. The creolized dialogue between characters is gritty and uncompromising as the new colonial citizens learn to survive and reinvent themselves in the punishing big city.
The dialogue is interspersed with symbolic dance by Nevena Stojkov, and one of most powerful images of the play is an exquisitely choreographed moment (reminiscent of For Black Boys Who Have Considered Suicide When The Hue Gets Too Heavy) where the men repeatedly catch each before they fall.
The set by Laura Anne Price simply consists of seven suitcases, while the props of a gun, a knife and booze are set into the wall at the back, and seem to represent the easy tempting self-destructive pathways the immigrants could opt into in their often hostile and alien ‘Motherland’.
Solomon Israel is mesmerising as Moses the haunted father figure who holds the newcomers together. Romario Simpson initially swaggers into London as ‘Sir Galahad’, but later battered and torn, he delivers a utterly heart wrenching monologue of self-hatred about the colour of his skin.
With malapropisms aplenty, Gilbert Kyem Jnr is hilarious as Big City but displays a dangerous rage when provoked. Tobi Bakare convincingly portrays an alcoholic who struggles to adapt to his new life and takes his frustrations out on his family. Shannon Hayes is fierce as his long suffering wife Agnes, and Carol Moses shines as Tanty, her no-nonsense mother-in-law. Aimee Powell sings and moves beautifully as Christina the surreal lost love who Moses left behind in the Caribbean.
Not all of Ebenezer Bamgboye’s directorial decisions were successful. It was sometimes difficult to see where The Lonely Londoners was heading and with some storylines over-egged, the production loses momentum making the evening feel even longer than the one hour fifty five minutes running time with no interval.
As an audience member the biggest challenge for myself personally was the relentless use of bright back lighting in The Lonely Londoners which seared into the retinas and often made viewing jarringly uncomfortable.
