This breezy comedy by the Guyana-born British playwright Michael Abbensetts was first staged in 1978, the same year that his soap opera Empire Road was broadcast. That TV show featured the comings and goings of a racially diverse street and made him the first Black British writer to have a series commissioned by the BBC. This play featuring the comings and goings of a tailor’s shop appears heavily influenced by the sitcom format.
Excavated from the National Theatre’s Black Plays Archive, with additional material contributed by Trish Cooke, the play is entirely set within the scruffy upstairs shop, crammed with clothes racks (set design by Frankie Bradshaw). The characters are racing to finish a large sewing order so are forced together overnight in the premises which is also their safe space from a racially hostile Britain, it seems. So they work, talk, dream, fight, horse around – and bet on the horses. They are a few steps up the economic ladder from Sam Selvon’s lonely Londoners and Abbensetts’ tone is more comic, but with the same undertow of meditative questioning about a sense of “home”.
Walker (Arinzé Kene), who runs the shop, is fuelled by ambition for all that this new world can bring him – namely a bigger establishment on Carnaby Street. His longsuffering wife, Darlene (Cherrelle Skeete), sacked from her factory job, speaks wistfully of their lives in Guyana. Shop junior Courtney (Raphel Famotibe), is more politicised while Horace (Karl Collins) has his sights set on Darlene, and Buster (Gershwyn Eustache Jr) is waiting for the birth of his first child – an unspoken marker for second-generation Black British identity.
Elegantly directed by Lynette Linton, this is a gently undulating drama whose humdrum conversations are sprinkled with Guyanese creole. There are critiques of the Black community and small but stinging references to the way in which white Britain sees them. Sometimes these bigger social aspects are subtle, other times they are latched on. The only white character is Mr Nat (Colin Mace) whose order the men are finishing, and he speaks of his graft as a Jewish immigrant and businessman in shoehorned ways. But maybe because of the richness of the performances, or because Abbensetts’ characters are so endearing, they feel real and make you care.
Slowly the play finds its focus through Walker’s middle-class ambitions, the price he pays to realise them and his marriage to Darlene. The only female character, she is given space to show her resilience and tortured love for Walker.
The edges of the stage buzz with non-realism as Walker’s shop dream is conjured and unnamed figures reflect his past or future, adding uncertainty to the comedy as they float by. Invigorating blasts of reggae (composed by Xana) in between scenes bring an elemental energy.
As a period piece, it is entirely dusted down and stands gleaming. Oliver Fenwick’s lighting design suffuses the stage in sepia as characters recount memories, or it spotlights them in emotional ways – a sentimental technique yet it works. For all its clunkier moments, this is undefinably winning drama. Perhaps it is down to the truth of the characters, so tender, hopeful, determined and unbeaten despite everything. A retro gem.
• At the Lyttelton theatre, National Theatre, London, until 5 April
