Nine Night is a first
play by Natasha Gordon and it is simply a gem. It has well-developed characters
in a plot that is funny, human and dramatic. The action climaxes in a heart
wrenching scene that you only see in superb productions.
The play is about the death and
aftermath of Gloria, a Jamaican woman, in England. Her family gather in her
house and Nine Night refers to traditional rituals associated with the funerals
of Jamaicans. The nine days of mourning
include music, drinking, eating and welcoming mourners.
Oliver
Alvin-Wilson, Natasha Gordon, Rebekah Murrell, Karl Collins and Cecilia Noble.
Photo: © Helen Murray
We never see Gloria but we do
meet seven members of her family. Her cousin Maggie (Cecilia Noble) and her
husband Vince (Karl Collins), both in their seventies, arrive. Aunt Maggie is
from the old school. She is opinionated, crotchety and simply hilarious.
Cecilia Noble’s performance is simply stellar as she waddles around the stage
and speaks in a Jamaican accent so thick that she was very difficult to
understand. It made little difference because the richness of her intonation left
no doubt about what she was saying, and she was both dramatic and funny.
That was not all. The deeply
humane Aunt Maggie breaks into an old Negro spiritual near the end of the play that
provides an amazing denouement to the play. I won’t give you more details lest
I spoil it for you.
Gloria had three children. Robert
(Oliver Alvin-Wilson) is a businessman who is looking for money for his ventures
even during his mother’s funeral. He is married to a white woman, Sophie
(Hattie Ladbury) and he knows how hurtful bigotry can be. When he met Sophie’s
mother, she looked at him as if her were an animal.
The voice of reason and the unifying
force of the family is Lorraine (played by the author) who must deal with her
daughter Anita (Adele James) who went for a degree instead of having children,
according to Uncle Vince. She reminds him that she got both. She is the future
of Jamaicans in England.
Gloria’s daughter Trudy (Michelle
Greenidge) is a pivotal character in the play and she brings the fate of some
immigrants into focus. Gloria left Trudy with her grandmother in Jamaica and
that created permanent wounds in Trudy’s and Gloria’s psyche. Through her life
and especially during her last days on earth, Gloria yearned and ached for the
daughter that she left behind. She had Robert and Lorraine with another man.
The pain and the longing as described seem to have been indescribably raw for
Gloria.
Photo: © Helen Murray
Trudy describes her own pain at
being abandoned with her grandmother. Lorraine insists that their mother never
truly abandoned Trudy and supported her financially and sent for her to come to
England. Trudy screams “never” in a piercing voice that expresses the
immeasurable agony of a child abandoned by her mother. It left me stunned and
is one of the most heart-wrenching climactic scenes that I have seen in recent
memory.
I have nothing but unstinting
praise for director Roy Alexander Weise and the entire cast. Gorden has given
us a snapshot of the life of Jamaican immigrants in England and a marvelous
play that contains humour and drama that add up to a great night at the
theatre.
__________
Nine Night by
Natasha Gordon had its world premiere on August 30, 2018 at the Dorfman Theatre
in a production by the National Theatre. On December 1, 2018 it transferred to
and continues until February 23, 2019 at Trafalgar Studios, 14 Whitehall,
London, SW1A 2DY http://www.trafalgar-studios.co.uk/
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