Music across Race and Generations
“Sexuality. Let’s just say that the Romans were a lot less repressed than our society is today in America.”
Gerry
On the stoop, the steps that lead up to the front door of an apartment block in Queens, New York, three men, all involved with music, gather.
Living on what we would call the first floor, is Gerry Brinsler (the wonderful Jasper Britton) a greying, gay man who loves musicals, from Jerome Kern’s 1927 Show Boat, the first to be classified as a musical with each song advancing the plot through to musicals by Rodgers and Hammerstein and to Stephen Sondheim. Gerry loathes hip hop and so the charms of Hamilton may have been lost on him.
We see Gerry switch on his record deck and play on “Getting to Know You” from The King and I but his pleasure is soon interrupted by different music from outside which gets louder. This is coming from the boombox of Lamont Born Cipher (a magnificent Sule Rimi) who is playing the hip hop Pete Rock remix to Public Enemy’s “Shut ‘Em Down”. Enter from the building Brandon Shaw, stage name Mr Bugz (a mysterious Richard Pepple) who greets Lamont. Gerry comes downstairs to light a cigarette but can’t find his lighter and returns to his floor.
Meanwhile Lamont and Mr Bugz discuss the merits of Eminem, the white American rapper, Marshall Bruce Mathers II, and why it should be that a white rapper should be so commercially successful. When Gerry re-enters with a lighter, the three men debate their love of different musical styles. Gerry offers them a martini and listening to “Hello Dolly” and they invite him to another style of gig.
It turns out that Mr Bugz is getting phone calls asking him to buy tickets for a musical and thinks Gerry gave them his number. There is fairly good-natured banter between the three and many opportunities for the audience to laugh. Gerry’s disclosure of his erotic dream raises his sexuality which we might already have guessed. When tension rises, Gerry is accused of racism and the two others of homophobia.
Enter Val Kano (Tiffany Gray) a young Puerto Rican woman who deals drugs and met Bugz as an intern at his radio station. Meanwhile Gerry tries to get Lamont to meet one of his cold call phone workers who has set record sales and worships Lamont. She is Nancy Renstein (Emma Kingston) and enthusiastically meets her hero Lamont. Gerry has plans for a musical about Ancient Rome and Nancy is working on a musical about Amelia Earhart.
Later we get an exciting dissing rap battle between the two women as a competition decided by the three men.
All three men have life difficulties which are shared. There are maybe too many themes to fully explore in Dan McCabe’s play but Amit Sharma, the new Artistic Director at The Kiln gets superb performances from his male cast that stay with you and the women battle effectively. I have long admired Jasper Britton’s witty characterisations and Sule Rimi is increasingly impressive on and off stage.
I loved Tom Piper’s huge set with massive posters of musicians on the lower floor with apartment details above. We hear that Gerry likes the TV artist Bob Ross’ “How to Paint” television programmes but the picture in Gerry’s flat is probably by Thomas Kinkade, a chocolate box artist as popular and as distasteful as Donald Trump.
Do sample a slice of musical life in New York in a diverse community with culture clash at The Kiln!
Editor of TheatreVibe.co.uk
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Production Notes
The Purists
Written by Dan McCabe
Directed by Amit Sharma
Cast
Starring:
Jasper Britton
Emma Kingston
Richard Pepple
Tiffany Gray
Sule Rimi
Creatives
Director: Amit Sharma
Set Designer: Tom Piper
Costume Designer: Ruth Badila
Lighting Designer: Oliver Fenwick
Sound Designer: Tony Gayle
Information
Running Time: Two hours 30 minutes including an interval
Booking to 21st December 2024
Theatre:
The Kiln
269 Kilburn High Road
Kilburn
London NW6 7JR
Rail/Tube:
Brondesbury,
Kilburn
Reviewed by
Lizzie
Loveridge
at
the Kiln
Theatre
on
22nd
November
2024