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Skylar has returned home to Port Talbot, disillusioned with life in London. Staying with her friend Meg, and meeting up with their other mates Jess & Courtney, all four try to deal with work, love, and life, while hiding behind a mix of drink, drugs and dancing. Meanwhile secrets are gradually revealed, old grudges resurface, and friendships are tested…

This play explodes with an intense energy, and a rhythm of language that is totally alien to me, yet is Port Talbot through and through. I’ve seen a lot of plays that were good, some even great, but not all had that special quality I’ve always looked for, the ‘wow factor’, and this play has it in spades. Written by Holly Carpenter, who also plays Skylar, the latest in our local production line of artists.

We’re famous for making steel here, but what’s not so well known is that we also make art. Burton, Hopkins, Sheen, and many more, we punch well above our weight, and although it might be early, I think we have another talent on our hands. As an actor Holly brings out the vulnerability of Skylar from behind her tough shell, a star turn, but her writing is just as impressive, and she is smart enough to give her fellow actors plenty of stage time.

The cast fully embody their characters, Meg, the calm eye in the middle of the hurricane, yet subtly knowing, especially about Skylar’s return. Jess, the career girl, manager of a travel agency yet with a wild side. Courtney, the ‘quiet’ girl with a secret of her own that might just change everything. And of course Skylar, the ‘hurricane’ itself, an equal mix of fury and doubt.

I found little in common with these four characters, but the fear of being a wage slave, a human hamster on the treadmill, rang a bell with me, as did the healing power of friendship.

For me the highlight was one character explaining their confusion over their sexuality through the medium of types of pie, which was funny, but also incredibly moving.

Jalisa Phoenix-Roberts gives Meg a hidden heart of gold, but with the strength to force Skylar to look at her true self.

Georgia Warlow shows Jess as someone with an anger born of desperation, yet remains a true friend.

Anna-Sophia Tutton portrays Courtney with a sweetness, but also with a subtle yearning.

The set is innovative and clever, a graffiti covered wall with hidden doors, cupboards and even a pull out bench. Director Samantha Alice Jones keeps the pace well, knowing when to ease the reins.

Although marketed as a comedy, and it is a very funny play, it’s also got hidden depths and important matters to discuss. Holly Carpenter has a lot of potential, I look forward to seeing what she comes up with next.

I don’t want to call it a love letter to Port Talbot but there’s no doubt it captures something of the hope that the town feeds on and the strength of the community within.

And if this is anything to go by, I think I’ve seen a future star.

Dumpy Biscuit is at the Plaza Port Talbot until June 29th.

19/10/23

(4 / 5)

“When I first heard someone from Swansea speak, I thought they were singing to me.” That’s a great tagline for a play, when you see it you really want to know more. 

Based on her own life, this was written by Lisa Zahra during lockdown, a time many of us spent reflecting on our lives. Born to a Welsh mother and an Iranian father, the Baba Joon (Dear Father) of the title. She grew up in Swansea and found it difficult to relate to her father’s heritage, despite the love she held for him, maybe because she was swamped by British culture. 

Her father arrived in the 1970’s and at first he was enamoured by his new country, thinking it “the greatest country in the world”, but he gradually became disillusioned, by Britain, by his success, and perhaps he also felt the Iranian version of ‘hiraeth’. Lisa was torn, always trying to be a good daughter while fitting in with the local community, at one point even using makeup to appear whiter than she was. It is difficult to be a child of two worlds when both compete for your love, and in a culture where even dancing can be a rebellion, it’s hard to know the right steps. 

There is poetry here, in the words and the rhythm of the languages, English, Welsh and Farsi. An influence of Dylan Thomas is unsurprising, and Zahra uses it to point out similarities between the Welsh and Iranian cultures, both famous for their poets, and she doesn’t stop there: Family, dance, music, even food, are all used evocatively. It’s been said that ‘food is memories’, because it brings back remembrance of such things as our childhoods.

The staging is like a 1990’s disco, with dry-ice fog, and an old portable TV set that is cleverly used to show switches between scenes in Iran and Wales. Zahra does not just focus on national differences, but also gender ones. Growing up in Wales she experienced racism, sexism and the double standards that come with being a daughter, and in Iran she found it the same, compounded by her being even more of a foreigner as she couldn’t speak the language fluently.

Voiceovers and music are used throughout, which I thought a flaw as I found it off putting sometimes. For me it broke the contact between actress and audience, which is so important in a show like this, and which she establishes so well. This minor quibble aside, I was enthralled by her semi-secret world, growing up in a Swansea where there were always eyes on her, British and Iranian, ready to criticise her every move. No wonder she felt relief at moving to Cardiff to study, finding the simple freedom of getting lost in a crowd. The scenes in the airport in Iran serve to highlight this.

I found the ending of the play annoying at first because there is no real end per se, no conclusion, and then I realised that this is by design. Life is messy, there are rarely easy solutions and not all questions are answered. We never find out why her father left his family, or why he left Britain, but perhaps that’s because she doesn’t know either.

I’ve always thought that good theatre should make you think, make you feel, or both. Lisa Zahra more than accomplishes that here. I was left with so many questions afterwards, and not just the clichéd ones, such as ‘who am I? Why am I here?’, but more difficult ones such as ‘where do I belong?’, or in the case of this play: ‘who are you, Baba?’  Thanks to Izzy Rabey’s excellent direction, the play moves at a good pace, and it sometimes feels like so much is coming at you in a short time, but then life itself is like that. In the end, it seemed to me to be about accepting who you are and being happy with it, and to Hell with anyone who says different. I don’t know about Iran, but that describes Swansea, Wales and I think Lisa herself in a nut-shell

(4 / 5)

“I was born brown, deaf and outside a prison…thanks Dad!” So begins this one-man show about a British-Indian, or Indian-Briton, or perhaps there’s even a third option.

Rinkoo Barpaga is a Sikh, born in Birmingham to parents from India, who’s been trying to find his ‘people’ all his life. Growing up during the Thatcher years, he experienced unemployment, prejudice and racism, all while observing the many ‘cultures’ he encountered. Learning sign language at a much older age than others left him feeling even more of an outsider, his first word, ‘dog’, was learnt from a friend in a car on the way to a special school. 

Bouncing between Birmingham, Newcastle & London, making friends while enduring double prejudice because he was deaf and brown, from hearing and (white) deaf alike, always wanting more than anything to understand and be understood. A career in entertainment was never his intention, falling into it by accident after becoming a translator for TV. Trying stand-up comedy both here and in America, he grew more accomplished, and started creating stage shows based on his life and travels. This being the latest result.

One of the most intriguing aspects of this play is that, unlike most others, instead of an interpreter for the deaf here we have an interpreter for the hearing. He becomes a sort of narrator in a way, speaking Rinkoo’s words in a voiceover to the acting, which gives us a fascinating insight into his world. Occasionally it misfires, the voice not always being synchronised to the signing, leading to the emotional impact being somewhat diluted. On the whole though, it adds a fresh new dimension to things.

In turns sad, joyous and painful, but always funny, Rinkoo passionately conveys the anger, fear and sheer frustration of his life due to his inability to communicate. The  irony is that it seems to be here on the stage that he communicates the best, offering us an insight into his world, a world I was almost completely unaware of. Both an entertaining and enlightening experience then, and one I truly enjoyed.

We recently published a new article on the return to physical Theatre performnces. In response to this article Get the Chance critic Kevin Johnson shares Theatre means to him.

Theatre was never part of my life growing up, only books, television, music & cinema, and the nearest one was ten miles away. Then one day I read in a newspaper that Ben Kingsley, who’d just won the Oscar for Gandhi,  was going to do a one-man show in London. For some reason I decided that I wanted to see that. A trip to London back then wasn’t simple, tickets had to be booked either by post or over the phone, months in advance in the days before the internet, and it meant an overnight stay, but luckily I had family there, so at least I didn’t need a hotel. I couldn’t have picked a more intimidating venue for my first play: The Theatre Royal Haymarket is the third oldest in London, built in 1720, and unlike most theatres in the capital which are huddled together in busy streets, it stands alone on a major thoroughfare, giving it plenty of space to be appreciated. This was due to a massive renewal scheme in 1820 sanctioned by the Prince Regent and overseen by architect John Nash. The buildings on either side are painted white, and although not part of the theatre itself they make it look much bigger than it is, while six giant Greco-Roman columns hold up a portico above the door like a temple. Inside it is even more intimidating, with murals on the walls and ceiling, and the main colour throughout is gold.

The Haymarket is on the upper scale of London theatres, both in its appearance, capacity  and in the quality of plays and actors performing there, and this permeates most aspects of the venue. During the interval, for example, as well as drinks from the bar, staff roam around with trays offering small bottles of wine and champagne, and the programmes for the plays are the classiest I have ever seen: the covers are a shiny black with the names picked out in – what else – but gold. 

The play was based on the real 19^th century actor Edmund Kean, who had also appeared at the Haymarket in his heyday. He was an actor of great renown, both for his talent and also his scandalous lifestyle. The poet Coleridge said that watching Kean act was like “reading Shakespeare by flashes of lightning”, for me, watching Ben Kingsley act was similarly mesmerising. I had always liked comedy, and there was plenty in this play, but what I had never experienced before was the sheer weight of silence, the heaviness of pause that a great actor can bring to a performance.

It wasn’t just me, the whole audience was enthralled, and you really could have heard a pin drop. That was the moment I became fascinated by the theatre, and I still am. It has brought me so many incredible memories over the years.

I was soon a regular at my nearest theatre, the Grand in Swansea, which actually has a bigger capacity than the Haymarket. The ‘Royal’ in its name I later found out meant that the theatre had received a licence from the reigning monarch to perform serious drama, whilst others could only perform lighter plays, comedies and variety.

The Grand has a pedigree too, founded in 1897, and I’ve seen many amazing moments there: Timothy West in Death of a Salesmen holding a whole audience in the palm of his hand. Other great memories include Anthony Hopkins in Pravda at the National Theatre doing an entire play with his voice in a much deeper, gravelly tone than I would have thought possible. His two Oscars notwithstanding, he is one of the finest actors I have ever seen. The National Theatre of Scotland touring with Black Watch at the Barbican, a play about the Scottish Regiment in Iraq, with songs, routines, even a mime, seemed to have everything but the kitchen sink yet was phenomenal, and one of the best live shows I’ve ever seen. Billy Piper in Yerma at the Young Vic, giving one of the greatest portrayals of human pain and the desire to be a mother ever seen onstage: Sophie Melville at the Sherman in Cardiff in Gary Owens’ Iphigenia In Splott, a searing one-woman monologue which put her in direct competition with Billy Piper for the Evening Standard Award.

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But ironically the best play I’ve ever seen occurred much closer to home than any of the others, in fact I was even a member of the cast: that was The Passion in Port Talbot. Performed over three days in Easter 2011, it was a passion play with a cast of nearly a thousand locals, a small band of professional actors, and Michael Sheen in the lead. It had an audience of nearly 20,000 in total, plus many more watching online, and was described by the Guardian as ‘one of the outstanding theatrical events not only of this year, but of the decade’. Sheen co-directed it with Bill Mitchell of Cornish company Wildworks, and they did an award-winning job. Written by Welsh poet Owen Sheers, it was simultaneously filmed as ‘The Gospel of Us’.

So if you haven’t already, give theatre a try, you may be as pleasantly surprised as I was and it could lead to a lifetime of great memories.

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