The Stage

I Have Before Me a Remarkable Document Given To Me by a Young Lady From Rwanda

Published Wednesday 3 November 2004 at 11:05 by Alistair Smith

Genocide is a huge subject to tackle on stage, and what is remarkable about Sonja Linden’s play is the close and personal nature of its scope. It is a play as much about the relationship between two people from different backgrounds as the hundreds of thousands who died, as much about race relations in Britain as in Rwanda and as much about the difficulty of writing about crimes against humanity as the horrendous acts themselves.

It centres around a friendship formed between Juliette, a young Rwandan asylum seeker, and Simon, a middle aged poet and writer in residence at a centre for refugees, who is trying to help Juliette to tell her story. Joe Young is entirely convincing as the good natured but self-involved poet, who slowly comes to understand the horrors through which his ‘client’ has passed. Meanwhile, Suzann Mclean shines as Juliette, capturing an innocent, almost childlike side to her nature, but also making her sharp and fiercely proud of her roots.

Faced with such a powerful play, Drew Ackroyd’s direction is commendably restrained, allowing the play to remain forceful and direct - a story about two people and the development of their relationship. This is aided by a stark and claustrophobic set, which serves to represent both Simon’s office and Juliette’s drab and depressing room.

Perhaps the most surprising element of the production, however, is the amount of humour which the two actors manage to draw out of such a tragedy. This is an extremely effective production of a fabulous, moving and important piece of theatre.