Belong (Local)

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Date	Time	Venue	Notes	Prices	Booking Link
Available Performances
Dates in May
Thu 31 May 2012	7:45pm	Press Night	The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Dates in June
Fri 1 Jun 2012	7:45pm		The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Sat 2 Jun 2012	3:30pm	Saturday Matinees	The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Sat 2 Jun 2012	7:45pm		The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Wed 6 Jun 2012	7:45pm		The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Thu 7 Jun 2012	7:45pm		The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Fri 8 Jun 2012	7:45pm		The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Sat 9 Jun 2012	3:30pm	Saturday Matinees	The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Sat 9 Jun 2012	7:45pm		The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Mon 11 Jun 2012	7:45pm		The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Tue 12 Jun 2012	7:45pm		The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Wed 13 Jun 2012	3:30pm	Mid-Week Matinee	The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Wed 13 Jun 2012	7:45pm		The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Thu 14 Jun 2012	7:45pm		The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Fri 15 Jun 2012	7:45pm		The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Sat 16 Jun 2012	3:30pm	Saturday Matinees	The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Sat 16 Jun 2012	7:45pm		The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Mon 18 Jun 2012	7:45pm	Post-Show Talk	The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Tue 19 Jun 2012	7:45pm		The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Wed 20 Jun 2012	3:30pm	Mid-Week Matinee, Post-Show Talk	The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Wed 20 Jun 2012	7:45pm		The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Thu 21 Jun 2012	7:45pm	Captioned Performance	The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Fri 22 Jun 2012	7:45pm		The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Sat 23 Jun 2012	3:30pm	Saturday Matinees	The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Sat 23 Jun 2012	7:45pm		The Bussey Building, 133 Rye Lane, London SE15 4ST	£10, £8 concs
Sold out Performances

Reviews

4 stars The Times by Libby Purves, 3 May 2012

Ah, now here’s a sharp one! Tiata Fahodzi, the British-African company with its new artistic director Lucian Msamati in the leading role, bring to the Royal Court Upstairs a funny, honest and bitingly dark play by Bola Agbaje. Her last one (Gone Too Far) transferred downstairs and sold out. So should this.

Not a dull moment or an unintelligent line: and coming of a Nigerian family, Agbaje can drill into psychological, moral and political dilemmas which make many white ones seem positively bloodless, in every sense. We first meet our hero, the politician Kayode, sulking on a Croydon sofa in a Tracey Emin chaos of bottles, newspapers, torn election posters and takeaways. He has lost the election and is acerbically informed by his wife Rita (a cool, sophisticated Noma Dumezweni) that he is “trending on Twitter and being discussed on Loose Women”. He scored the own-goal of a “racist tweet” , insulting his equally black (but presumably West Indian) opponent.

Fresh off the plane erupts their woman friend Fola, a noisy sexy extrovert with a crush on him and a remit to persuade educated Nigerians to come home. Rita, a thoroughly second-generation Briton, hates her ancestral homeland — heat, flies, corruption — and knows that Kayode’s mother back home despises her .

He, on the other hand, feels that a trip would restore his spirits. Msamati nicely evokes the patriarchal grumpiness of the defeated UK politician, glaring and sulking as his Mama (a turbaned tornado played with terrifying conviction by Pamela Nomvete) prays and berates him into his old role as her clever son. He always was too European in his tastes, attracting mockery by eating with a fork. The houseboy calls him “Mr English Sir”.

Mama wants him to mentor her protegé, a naive former street-kid running in a Nigerian local election. The lad is in thrall to the local “Big Man”, a showy Chief played with brutal arrogance by Richard Pepple. Perilously for all three, the Westminster sophisticate gets lured into the politics of a country he no longer understands. The clash of African and European, exuberant hustler mentality against careful legalistic idealism, is both internal and, violently, external. Indhu Rubasingham directs, though the vigorous cast give the sense that they are doing it for themselves. Which is a tribute to her.

Evening Standard by Henry Hitchings, 3 May 2012

The theatre company Tiata Fahodzi exists to celebrate and question the experiences of Africans. Here in this co-production with the Royal Court, which will transfer to Peckham’s Bussey Building at the end of the month, it showcases the work of Bola Agbaje, a former nominee for this paper’s most promising playwright award. Lucian Msamati, the company’s artistic director, plays Kayode, a British MP who loses his seat as a result of slinging nasty allegations at an opponent — a sign to his constituents that he has lost touch with their views.

Chastened, he returns to his native Nigeria, against the wishes of wife Rita (a potent Noma Dumezweni). Ostensibly this is to take a break and see his mother. But other possibilities soon present themselves.

Meanwhile Rita has to put up with her raucous friend Fola, who mocks her for being insufficiently true to her origins (“Your nose is up in the air like you have smelt something dirty”). As the action switches between the two countries, Agbaje suggests their distinct cultures while evoking some of the pressures and uncertainties that face immigrants — both in their new homes and when they return to their roots.

Kayode is surprised to find his mother has an adopted son, Kunle (Ashley Zhangazha), and he’s struck by the generosity bestowed on this idealistic young man, who is seen as having leadership potential. Kayode contrives to get embroiled in Nigerian politics — a little implausibly. As he becomes more politically engaged he has to embrace elements of Nigerian culture. Yet his motives are questionable, and Msamati perfectly captures his mixture of defiance and awkwardness.

Agbaje’s writing is funny and pointed, asking questions about corruption and identity. Indhu Rubasingham’s production creates moments of real power, notably when Kayode struggles to make himself heard above the din of a teeming marketplace. The result is a tense and engaging if not always wholly persuasive satire.

Sunday Times by Maxie Szalwinska, 6 May 2012

Kayode, a Nigerian-born, British-raised MP, is hiding under his duvet. He’s having a bad day after suffering an electoral defeat, and decides to return to Nigeria to recover and see his family. Once there, he finds his mother has acquired an adoptive son and gets caught up in tit-for-tat local politics. Kayode (Lucian Msamati) is also torn between the conflicting demands of his wife in London and his mother, jovial yet indefatigably contemptuous of her daughter-in-law. Where and to whom does Kayode belong? Bola Agbaje’s play doesn’t tiptoe around its questions of race and identity — it plunges right in. The drama isn’t always persuasive, and the actions of its protagonist don’t always add up, but Indhu Rubasingham’s production starts jauntily, darkening as it goes along.

Variety by David Benedict, 3 May 2012

“For the first time in my life I’m not reminded that I’m black. You can’t begin to imagine what that feels like.” That heartfelt cry by Kayode (Lucian Msamati) is not just the climax of Bola Agbaje’s engaging new play “Belong,” it’s the thematic pivot. Vigorous acting in Indhu Rubasingham’s precise production gives energetic life to the play’s examination of identity and exactly what constitutes “home,” but although Agbaje sustains her impressively comic edge even as the material deepens, the increasing weakness of her plotting ultimately undermines the drama.

Having just lost an election in London thanks to stirring up racial controversy — “You’re still trending on Twitter,” sighs his wife Rita (gracefully long-suffering Noma Dumezweni) — black Nigerian politician Kayode decides to escape the heat by going to stay with his wealthy mother (Pamela Nomvete) in Nigeria.

But it’s not just the discomfort of being a 45-year-old suddenly under his powerful mother’s thumb that rankles. As he slowly discovers, being Nigerian-born is not enough. His position as a black man in his home country is massively compromised by his status as a highly educated, middle-class Brit. Moreover, his staunchly conservative way of doing things flies in the face of the practices of a divided society that, despite its rapid growth, or possibly because of it, is riven by corruption.

Agbaje smartly balances Kayode’s struggle with arguments at his London home between London-loving Rita and their relentlessly superficial, one-time friend Fola (nicely comic Jocelyn Jee Esien) who always knows what’s best (i.e. attracting any/everyone to Nigeria) and has never come to grips with the concept of listening to other people. Thanks to Ben Stones’ versatile design, the similarity of the arguments in both countries is neatly underlined by having the same space double as opposing locations.

Wheedling, cajoling and switching between faux innocence and tough-mindedness, Pamela Nomvete lights up the stage as Mama. Alternately highly amusing and coldly authoritative, her focused energy stems from the richness of characterization that drives Agbaje’s writing. It’s surprising, therefore, to find the central character so underwritten.

Msamati is an actor of extraordinary range but even he cannot lend Kayode more than a sense of frustrated zeal. There’s less of a fully-fledged character here, more a position around which Agbaje voices concerns about political identity. And the deeper she sends him into contemporary Nigerian politics — notably in Rubasingham’s powerfully staged electioneering scene — the more naive and less plausible the character grows. Agbaje is intent upon raising the stakes via the manipulations of power-broking local Chief Olowolaye (charismatic Richard Pepple) but although the resulting bribery and violence ring horribly true, the thinly written narrative is too contrived for the climax to carry its intended weight.

Agbaje’s 2008 debut, written when she was 26, won her an Olivier award. Although the whole is less satisfying than its parts, “Belong” is further proof of talent. Rubasingham’s beautifully balanced cast reveal the immediacy of the writing that creates real connection between audience and material. 4 stars TimeOut by Bella Todd, 8 May 2012

In ‘Dreams from My Father’, Barack Obama talks about the tragedy of a ‘divided soul’, torn between continents. This is the central dilemma of ‘Belong’, in which a British MP, sore from election defeat, quits Croydon to set up as the ‘Obama of Nigeria’. Olivier-winner Bola Agbaje’s co-commission for the Royal Court and African company Tiata Fahodzi buzzes with dynamic characters under the brilliant direction of Indhu Rubasingham.

So it’s significant that, when not moonwalking for his mother or electrifying the marketplace with his oratory, Lucian Msamati’s Kayode seems curiously empty. Leaving behind the council estates of previous hits ‘Gone Too Far!’ and ‘Off the Endz’, Agbaje opens in Kayode and his wife Rita’s middle-class pad.

Little change is needed for the switch to a westernised Nigeria, where Pamela Nomvete’s Mama greets her prodigal son with a set of designer handbags as loud as her disapprobation and her love, and Richard Pepple’s corrupt Chief Olowolaye – a pantomime villain with crocodile shoes to match his smile – announces that he follows Kayode on Twitter.

Is nationality a question of birthplace or skin colour? Is the future of a troubled country best shaped by those who stayed or those who left? Having packed in the provocative questions along with the belly laughs – and one almighty parting gut-punch – ‘Belong’ leaves us questioning. One thing is for sure though, this talented young writer belongs firmly in the vanguard of contemporary British theatre.

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