ArtwordBlog

The Oval House Theatre in South London, just by the cricket ground, is an arts complex with two theatres and a cafeteria/gallery, specializing in Caribbean/African work. The atmosphere is casual and friendly. It’s the kind of theatre you should go to an hour ahead of time so you can have a glass of wine and a spicy plate of  jerked chicken, look round at the art, and maybe join in a stimulating  conversation with the people at the next table. There are two theatre spaces. The play we came to see was in the tiny upstairs space – 56 seats on three levels, arranged on three sides of the playing area. Intimate.

The play was a version of Shakespeare’s Two Gentlemen of Verona (aka Vakomana Vaviri Ve Zimbabwe), performed by two actors, Denton Chikura and Tonderai Munyevu, from Zimbabwe. In English.

Actually, that’s what gets the play underway – a dispute between two Shona taxidrivers over who is best qualified to take a member of the audience to her hotel. “You speak to her in Shona? Can’t you see she’s English? You don’t speak English.” “I speak English.” “You speak English?” “My grandfather was William Shakespeare!” And from there, the play never looks back – well, maybe once or twice, when the two cab drivers peek out between Shakespeare’s lines.

Let it be said that the lines are spoken with a clarity and conviction that make the meaning remarkably transparent. Add to this the fact that the overarching  intention of the actors in the whole piece is to prove that they can communicate, and you have a version of the play that is as easy to follow as it is outrageously funny.  Oddly enough, it seems to me that this production,  directed by Arne Pohlmeier, taps into the spirit of the original Elizabethan performances, when the actors had to catch and hold the attention of a restive audience who might just as well have chosen to attend the bearbating down the street.

Of course, there are considerably more than two characters in Shakespeare’s script, and while many of the scenes are basically two-handers, there are times when more than two characters are needed, if only to listen. Members of the audience are pressed into service. While for some this is a worst nightmare (“don’t sit in the front row, you’ll have an actor in your lap!”), in this production the audience involvement is graceful and painless. Judith was asked to groan at one point, but she was laughing so hard she couldn’t get the groan out, while the play stopped and the actor waited with deliciously feigned patience.

At one point, the actors take a little break, drinking water out of plastic bottles. A woman in the audience wondered whether this was the intermission. (There is none.)  The actors offered her some water, but she declined – she wants white wine. The usher was sent out and returned with a glass of wine.

The characterizations, male and female, are accomplished with deftness and great economy. Using a storytelling approach, the actors eschew surface detail in favour of the essential spirit of the characters.

The inventiveness of the production just wouldn’t quit.  The arrangement of “Who is Sylvia, what is she”, accompanied by kalimba (aka. thumb piano) was a case in particular point.

Years ago (don’t ask how many), we arrived in London and on our first night saw the original production of Woza Albert. This is theatre that makes it worth while flying all the way to London.  And that’s how we felt again when we saw  the Zimbabwean Two Gentlemen. This is what we came to London to find.

Sadly, we saw the second-last performance in this run, and the show has now closed. Hopefully, this is not the end of this clever piece, but a beginning.