Unfinished Histories - Staged Readings
Fri 11 & Sat 12 December / Doors 7 PM / Performance 7:30 PM
As part of the public programme for Fifty Years of the Fight for Inclusion III: Black & Asian Theatre in Britain Unfinished Histories presents a triple bill of intimate staged readings comprising forgotten or unpublished one-person plays:
Slipping Into Darkness by Jamal Ali
Madhuri, I Love You by Parminder Sekhon
One of Us by Jacqui Shapiro and Meera Syal
Originally produced by Black Theatre Cooperative in 1988, Slipping Into Darkness is a powerful monologue by poet and playwright Jamal Ali, a veteran of Radical Poets and Players and Black Theatre of Brixton. His play Dark Days and Light Nights formed the basis for the 1977 film Black Joy. Reviewers described Ali’s rap monologue as “a political tract with blood pressure”, a “poem about a Black Londoner’s sense of his race’s tragedy” and “a mesh of sinuous poetry”.
In Madhuri, I Love You, 13 year-old Amarjit escapes from the realities of life in Preston into her fantasies of Bollywood star Madhuri Dixit.
Originally written by Jacqui Shapiro from Meera Syal’s improvisations in 1983, One of Us is a one-woman show about a young Asian woman called Nishi. Nishi is navigating the industry’s stereotypes of Asian women, trying to fulfil her dreams of being an actress, while finding her way through the realities of working in her family’s shop as a roller-skating waitress with a giant prawn on her head. One of Us toured to Asian girls’ groups by Red Ladder theatre in 1988. Syal went on to become a major figure in stand-up comedy including Goodness Gracious Me, and an acclaimed actress, while Shapiro, writing as Jacqueline Saphra, is an award-winning poet.
About
Unfinished Histories was founded in 2006 by Dr. Susan Croft and Jessica Higgs and later established as an independent organisation in 2012. It is dedicated to preserving and celebrating the history of Alternative Theatre in Britain from the 1960s to the 1980s.
These staged readings are part of the exhibition and events programme Fifty Years of the Fight for Inclusion III: Black & Asian Theatre in Britain. They take place during the closing weekend of Radical Rediscovery III: What Survives? 50 years since ‘The Arts Britain Ignores’, an archival exhibition that celebrates half a century of Black and Asian theatre in the UK. The programme is organised by Unfinished Histories as part of the Associate Artists Programme.
London Performance Studios is located in the Penarth Centre, an industrial building in South Bermondsey.
Unfortunately, Studio 1 does not have step-free access (18 steps). The Penarth Centre does not currently have an operational lift.