04-Oct-2010

This piece of semi-autobiographical culture clash drama is the result of a collaboration between Eastern Angles and the Nottingham Theatre Writing Partnership and is designed to mark Black History Month.

Taiye, a young man with a white British mother and a black Nigerian father, sets off to visit the country where he was conceived out of wedlock and meet the family - and particularly the father, Abraham - he has never known.

He is haunted by the restless spirit of his dead twin brother - compelling him to make the journey to enable him to find eternal peace.

Fresh from London, Taiye and his mother find themselves in an Africa of street crime, bribery, noise, suspicion, greed, lust and jealousy. Just like home, then, although London seems a far safer place as the two are told to keep their heads down and stay inside the dwelling of their hosts.

Eventually Taiye gets to meet Abraham (and his two wives) while the attraction between his parents is rekindled and family tensions revealed.

While the truth is that I failed to become fully engaged by the story, the four actors were terrific - individually and as a team - and this production fairly sizzled with energy and ideas.

Joe Jacobs as Taiye, the innocent abroad, gave a sparkling, assured performance and also displayed a fantastic singing voice. Zachary Momoh as his younger brother, Femi, was superb, creating a character both streetwise and vulnerable.

Antoinette Marie Tagoe as Stella, Abraham's wife, proud but grasping, was full of energy and attack, an artful, very watchable actor, while Helen Grady provided the perfect, understated contrast as Jane, Taiye's mum - nervous, diffident but ultimately practical.

While developed as a collaboration, this production has the trademark of Eastern Angles all over it. The actors effortlessly double up as other characters, including ghostly apparitions from both cultures, and imaginatively convert props into other uses; suitcases at various times become vehicles, chairs and a bed. A simple set is backed by a screen used for shadow work while the cast change costume in view of the audience.

The rhythms and sounds of Africa - created by the actors via drums, rattles and voices - enrich the performance and this high quality production, directed by Ivan Cutting and Kate Chapman, is a visual and vocal treat.

David Green

04-Oct-2010

Initially, I wasn't entirely sure what to think of the play from its title Palm Wine & Stout which I caught at the Sir John Mills Theatre in Ipswich.

After all, the title brings up an array of ideas into one's mind.

However, I found that after the first few minutes with a brilliant entrance by the cast, involving comedic interaction with the audience, the play captured my attention and kept me entranced until the very end.

Palm Wine & Stout can be described as a culture clash between British and Nigerian societies that utilises great music, choreography and excellent storytelling to create a wonderful experience for the audience that takes us through the ups and downs of the emotional spectrum.

The story follows the journey of Taiye (portrayed by Joe Jacobs), from England back to his father's homeland.

He has been guided to Africa by the spirit of his dead brother and on this journey he sees the differences in family life compared to what he is used to in England.

The storytelling is done in a quite a fast and fluid manner with amazing instances of humour that had the audience laughing.

However, this does not leave the audience feeling lost due to the beautiful crafting of this piece by the writer Segun Lee-French.

The play makes great usage of music and lighting to create several thrilling scenes which adds a another level of atmospheric depth with songs sung in Nigerian and English.

The music sets the pace very well and helps the transition from one scene to another splendidly.

Contrasting characters

The cast gave an absolutely wonderful performance even though there were only four actors on stage creating a multitude of unique characters with individual accents.

The small stage set gave the actors a fast and easy manner with which they could switch from one character to another, thereby never slowing the pace of the play.

This also helped in utilising various costumes to great effect throughout the play.

Ipswich actress Antoinette Tagoe did an amazing job playing numerous roles, each usually on stage one after the other.

Helen Grady and Zackary Momoh played out contrasting characters whose stage presence provided quite a lot of the humour along with creating great dramatic tones.

Joe Jacobs fitted right into the skin of his character by giving a brilliant performance and keeping the audience involved through the inner monologues where he almost appears to be speaking to each of us individually.

The play, although quite funny during most of the first half got a lot darker in tone in the second half, while retaining the humour.

The story is of a man coming to terms with his culture and heritage, but as it draws towards its end the play seems to centre around his family within this culture.

The main message seems to be how having each other can help get us through dark times as well as showing a sense of unity between family and community.

Uppahar Subba

03-Oct-2010

A young man of mixed parentage - English mother, Nigerian father - goes to Africa to re-establish contact with his family there, most specifically with his father. It's a very different society to his usual one with tribal traditions (including several wives being considered the norm for a man of chieftain rank) and a Christian fervour somewhat at war with both the indigenous culture land that left over from colonial rule.

His mother copes much better than he does. She's accepting rather than challenging, and knows when it's futile to try to change either things or people. So this semi-autobiographical play by Segun Lee-French is on one level a rite-of-passage drama. The touring production by Ivan Cutting and uses just four actors on a simple platform set surrounded by the clothes racks which allow quick costume changes as the players take on a multitude of roles.

Joe Jacobs is good as Taiye who rediscovers his father and half-siblings only for death and its aftermath to intervene. Helen Grady plays his mother Jane with a ferocious double as the local Big Man. Antoientte Marie Tagoe sashays lithely as Stella, the widow who resents his husband's other attachments and there is a well thought-out portrait of Femi, Taiye's African brother with a full-scale chip biting into his shoulder by Zackary Momoh.

Anne Morley Priestman

11-Oct-2010

With Segun Lee-French's semi-autobiographical story about a young mixed parentage Englishman, Taiye, searching for his identity in Africa, Eastern Angles breaks with its tradition of staging plays with a local regional theme. And to fine effect.

The familiar EA components are there - sparse set, intimate atmosphere, economic use of props such as a set of suitcases being transformed into a bed or madly careering taxi. The setting, however, is steamy, confrontational Nigeria, not Norwich. It's a tale of pride and tenderness, money and mourning- warm, sharp, funny and refreshingly challenging.

Joe Jacobs is nicely naturalistic as Taiye, whose joy at meeting up with his father and brother gradually turns into exasperation at the cultural differences, then grief at the loss of a father he has only just met.

Jacobs, who possesses a lovely, evocative singing voice, is the only single-character performer, the three other actors tackling a range of personae and managing it with talent to spare. Helen Grady swaps easily from playing Taiye's beautifully measured mother Jane into tribal villager mode, while the lithe Antoinette Marie Tagoe brings firecracker energy and tension into her roles, primarily widow Stella.

Most impressive is Zackary Momoh, a young actor whose ability to effortlessly morph from one voice, physique and emotion to another was a privilege to watch. In the latter stages of the play, when the plot gets just a little convoluted and the pace loses a touch of its rhythm, Momoh still manages to bring focus with a carefully honed mix of forcefulness and vulnerability in the shape of father Abraham and brother Femi.

Ben Sharratt

28-Oct-2010

Nigeria comes to East Anglia.
Did I hear aright - they've been brewing Guinness for years in Nigeria? Anyway, mixed-race Taiye enjoys a bottle in a celebratory moment during visits to his father's homeland. Where he's introduced to the local brew, palm wine. Cautious at first, it only takes a single taste to convert him - though these are about his only drinking moments in the play.

For dramatist Segun Lee-French is more interested in the two strands of Taiye's identity as he takes his White English mother to Nigeria and meets the rest of the family. His father has more than one wife (and seems intent on adding to the number upon meeting Jane) and there are several conflicts between these wives, as well as matters of cultural acclimatisation - which can lead to some overt factual infilling from Joe Jacobs' Taiye in his recurrent direct-to-audience comments.

A sudden death ends act one, casting a more serious mood over the second half. Yet the production works best when events are buoyant; the most serious moments have a tendency to be ponderous. And the small-scale limitations become apparent in group dancing scenes, where masks and costume changes don't create separate identities for the four-strong acting company: it's very evident who is really who.

But Eastern Angles, working with Nottingham-based Theatre Writing Partnership and others, have a good cast all round, while the use of suitcases to form most of the set - sofa, car, bus, mortuary-slab - makes for versatility and enhances the sense of people on the move.

The biggest visual impression, though, comes from the actors. Jacobs' Taiye would be considered African by descent by most White people - yet his light complexion, while distinct from his mother, means he's labelled White in a Nigeria where the darker hues of Zackary Momoh and Antoinette Marie Tagoe are presumably more standard.

Lee-French has some pointed moments - Jane's fear of Nigerian-style driving leads to anxious warnings to Taiye not to lean his arm through the car window. Tagoe has a vivacity that can show pure joy or annoyance while Momoh distinguishes between confident Femi and stooping, yet self-assured old father Abraham.