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The brown word: Death on the Throne @gatehouselondon

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We’re warned at the start of the show with an upbeat number that this is not the usual sort of musical. And it turns out to be just that. But with boundless enthusiasm and energy from its two leads, who deploy a range of voices and breathtaking energy to create a series of voices for puppet characters, a bedtime story becomes a silly oddball tale about four souls stuck in purgatory. With puppets. And various toilet humour references. It’s currently playing at Upstairs At The Gatehouse . The piece starts as a bedtime story. Daddy (Mark Underwood) is about to read a bedtime story for Louise (Sarah Louise Hughes). But her stomach felt funny, and soon, she went to the bathroom. Then, for reasons that seem to only make sense in the confines of the show, they start telling the story of four people who died in unfortunate circumstances in the bathroom. Depicted as puppets, they’re stuck in purgatory as St Peter doesn’t have enough space for each of them in the afterlife. And so begins a puppe...

Sneak previews and gospel singing: The Amen Corner

This week I was lucky enough to catch a rehearsal of the first act of The Amen Corner, which starts previewing at the National Theatre next week. Within forty five minutes it is fascinating to see even in rehearsal how all the elements of the story are laid out.

The play is set in Harlem in the 1950s and tells the story of a fiery pastor Sister Margaret whose estranged husband unexpectedly returns. Combined with the antics of her son her congregation is soon in revolt against her hard line leadership.


Written by James Baldwin, it was his first attempt at a play and covers the role of the church in African American families, along with how racial prejudice led to ingrained poverty amongst the communities. Jazz and gospel singing features throughout the piece and this will include members from the London Community Gospel Choir.

Even in rehearsal the cast and performances from both some new and familiar faces will be sure to enthral. After the rehearsal we were trying to work out when this play was staged in London. It possibly was staged in the 1970s at the Tricycle Theatre, but in a time of economic crisis and questions around hard line religion, it is perhaps time for the show to have its run in London.

One to discover and also part of the £12 Travelex season... Check the website for details of the run...

More details on the show are in the following...


Background to the photoshoot is below...

Photo credits: Marianne Jean-Baptiste (Sister Margaret Alexander) and Eric Kofi Abrefa (her son, David). Photo by Richard Hubert Smith.

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