Theatre reviews: East is East | Barnum
Although it was written 30 years ago and is set in the 1970s, East is East addresses issues that still haunt UK politics today, writes Joyce McMillan
East is East, Citizens’ Theatre, Glasgow ★★★★
Barnum, Festival Theatre, Edinburgh ★★★
Ayub Khan Din’s groundbreaking family drama East is East was first seen in Birmingham in 1996; and this new production, created in Bolton for the Citizen’s Theatre, the Bolton Octagon and Wiltshire Creative, therefore marks a well-deserved celebration of its 30th anniversary.
The play is set, though, back in 1971, when Ayub Khan Din was a little lad growing up in Salford; and it comes as a reminder of a very different world. In its portrayal of domestic violence, for example, it recalls a time when a father’s violence towards his wife and children was not the line-crossing terminal event we now feel it should be. Khan Din’s central character, George - who arrived in the UK in 1930, and is now the owner of a successful chip shop, as well as husband to white British woman Ella, and father to seven grown children - is allowed to be both frighteningly violent towards Ella and his sons, and also a poignant and sometimes lovable character, painfully caught between a traditionalist Pakistani community, and a confused and often racist Britain.
And in its portrayal of life in a small house where six almost grown-up children still live under the same roof as their parents, the play also reminds us of a kind of family life that much of the UK has already forgotten, where children grew up among a pack of siblings all scrambling and fighting for the biggest helpings of everything. It’s the sheer vividness of this portrayal - full of comedy and physicality - that makes the early scenes of East Is East so exhilarating; and as the story grows more sombre, it’s the sense of the warmth and intimacy underlying serious family conflict that makes the unfolding drama as poignant as it is sometimes shocking.
On a vivid 70s domestic set by Rachana Javad, director Kash Arshad delivers an extraordinarily clear and absorbing production, which gives real depth and weight to all nine characters - including Ella’s sister Annie, played in best Salford style by Victoria Brazier - in just two hours plus an interval. Bhasker Patel’s central performance as George is both infuriating and heartbreaking; Samantha Power’s Ella a truly memorable portrait of working-class female wit and resilience, against frightening odds. And it’s notable that the questions their sons are facing - are they English? Are they Pakistani? Are they allowed to be both? - still haunt UK politics today; more than half a century after they should have been laid to rest, for good.
The 1980 musical Barnum, by contrast, is a strange and lavish extravaganza of a show, that somehow amounts to slightly less than the sum of its parts. In the latest Bill Kenwright touring version - at the Festival Theatre this week - it certainly looks like a show that has everything, as it ranges through the life story of the great 19th century American impresario PT Barnum. There are acrobats, jugglers and clowns, gloriously vivid and colourful set and costume designs, a multi-talented cast playing musical instruments as well as acting, singing and dancing, and song after song, most of them about the joys of circus, or the love story between Matt Rawle’s Barnum and his wonderfully capable and loving wife Charity, beautifully played by Monique Young.
The show’s problem, though, is that its narrative structure is fitful at best. At first, it’s all Barnum and Charity, then for about five minutes it’s Barnum and his star act Jenny Lind, then he goes back to his wife, is widowed, and contemplates death. The dramatic stakes seem low, the songs are loud but unremarkable; and despite some fabulous singing - notably from Penny Ashmore as Jenny Lind, and Dominique Planter in various roles - this often seems like a show that provides a feast for the eyes, but little nourishment for the mind, or the heart.
East is East is at the Citizens’ Theatre, Glasgow until 17 October; Barnum is at the Festival Theatre, Edinburgh, until 10 October.
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