... ...cake E-Book

babirye bukilwa

• Herausgeber: Nick Hern Books
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Serie: NHB Modern Plays
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 55

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

'everything i do kills you. i don't know if i love you because i have to or because i can't help it… i don't know if both of those things are bad.' It's one of those hot April evenings that feel like summer, and the heat is stifling in Sissy's London flat as she dances, unrestrained, beautiful, alive… But when sixteen-year-old Eshe arrives, powerful emotions come to the surface – and the two women are locked in a dance where freedom clashes with duty. babriye bukilwa's play …cake is a psychological drama that asks if the cycle of generational trauma can ever be broken. Can queer, Black femmes find love and belonging when the soil beneath them – and the climate around them – is hostile? It was first performed at Theatre Peckham, London, in 2021, directed by the venue's Associate Director, malakaï sargeant.

Leseprobe

babirye bukilwa

…cake

NICK HERN BOOKS

London

www.nickhernbooks.co.uk

Contents

Director’s Note – malakaï sargeant

Artistic Director’s Note – Suzann McLean

Dedication

Epigraph

…cake

dear diary… Extracts from Eshe’s Diary

About the Author

Copyright and Performing Rights Information

Director’s Note

When I saw the staged reading of …blackbird hour, the first play in bukilwa’s hauntingly honest trilogy, my whole soul wept. To be able to revisit Eshe’s story almost two years later, and to be the person responsible for bringing this story to life, is nothing short of an honour.

babirye deserves nothing more than for their work to be produced, and for its contexts to be treated with sensitivity, care and empathy – that’s why all of our creative team is Black, with the majority of them also being queer. My hope is that it will enable us to truly create authentically, without the burden of having to explain who and why we are to people who don’t share our lived experience. We should all feel entitled to feeling safe and legitimised at work; I’m gassed to be in a position where I can make that a reality for babirye and our peers – and ultimately to share this story with the world.

malakaï sargeant

Artistic Director’s Note

babirye’s writing is innovative and pushes the boundaries of form. Providing a safe space and a platform to thrive stays true to the mission of Theatre Peckham. This is a vital and bold new play which honours intersectionality and recentres voices which will connect not only with our local community but with audiences London-wide.

Suzann McLean

…cake forms part of Suzann McLean, Theatre Peckham’s Artistic Director’s re-opening programme which champions the work of creatives from socially and culturally unique walks of life and challenges existing structures to support the growth of a representative sector.

…cake was first performed at Theatre Peckham, London, on 13 July 2021. The cast and creative team was as follows:

SISSY

Danielle Kassarate

ESHE

Donna Banya

Director

malakaï sargeant

Set and Costume Designer

Debbie Duru

Design Associate

Rema Kahsay

Sound Designer

Xana

Associate Sound Designer

Kayode Gomez

Lighting Designer

Luke Goodlitt

Vocal Coach

Eleanor Manners

Movement Director

Gerrard Martin

For Sissys and their Eshes

For Adaego and Yvonne

Thank you to Shalisha, Michelle, Adrian, Myah and malakaï

I am fourteen and my skin has betrayed me the boy I cannot live without still sucks his thumb in secret how come my knees are always so ashy what if I die before morning and momma’s in the bedroom with the door closed.

Characters

SISSY, dark-skinned Black, forty-two

ESHE, dark-skinned Black, sixteen

Notes

This ebook was created before the end of rehearsals and so may differ slightly from the play as performed.

The Playlists

Pre-show/‘pre-spliff’ Music

What Sissy plays before the ‘play’ starts, as we walk in.

‘Maggot Brain’ – Funkadelic

‘Come Smoke My Herb’ – Meshell Ndegeocello

‘On & On’ – Erykah Badu

‘Just One of Those Days’ – Sizzla

‘Don’t Take It Personal (Just One of Dem Days)’ – Monica

‘Leviticus: F****t’ – Meshell Ndegeocello

music.apple.com/playlist/cake-the-pre-show/ pl.u-ZmblV8Jhz2zYAK

‘Play’ Music

What we experience once lights go down and then up: the ‘play’.

‘Jezebel’ – Sade ‘Is It a Crime’ – Sade ‘Fly Away’ – Lenny Kravitz ‘Smooth Operator’ (album version) – Sade ‘You Gotta Be’ – Des’ree ‘Purple Rain’ – Prince ‘Every Time We Say Goodbye’ – Ella Fitzgerald

10.57 p.m., Monday 14th April 2005. One of those evenings that feels like summer and tastes like it too. It’s a hot evening. We faintly hear a weather report on a radio warning hay-fever sufferers that it’s going to be a tough week ahead or something like that. We hear the faint hum of air conditioning. Maybe two large fans. It is dark and still. A woman appears. She remains there. She is wearing heels. In her right hand is a spliff. She lights it. In her left hand is a dead flower.

She walks to a vinyl player, she plays ‘Jezebel’ by Sade. She begins to come to life. As the song plays the woman starts to sing. She sings the lyrics. She sings made-up ones. A song she has never heard before. A melody that she will never hear again but one her soul knows well. It’s quite beautiful. She starts to move along with the music after a while. Ever so slightly. She plays imaginary piano. She plays an imaginary saxophone. She opens her fridge but takes nothing out. She stands in front of her fans. She really needed that. She looks into a mirror. But not for too long. She picks up a pillow from the floor. She makes the pillow her dance partner. A lover. A friend. A customer. She drinks some already opened wine. She spills some. She smokes the whole spliff. The entire song plays. It goes back to silence and stillness. Only for a second though. She looks at the time. She looks at the door. The next song to start is ‘It’s A Crime’ by Sade. Tune, man.

SISSY sings the first verse and chorus.

She stops the music. She takes it out and she snaps the vinyl into pieces. She throws them outside. She drinks some more wine. She chooses another vinyl to play. ‘Fly Away’ by Lenny Kravitz blasts. She turns on all the lights. Finally. We can see her. She picks up a fluffy dressing gown and wraps herself inside it. Stage-left is a large antique mirror with a crack from top to bottom. Behind a television lies a three-person sofa draped in Ugandan cloth and an assortment of African prints and patterns. Stage-right is a gallery of unfinished drawings and paintings. Vinyl cases act as art. Framed. Collected.

Vases, some empty, some with dying flowers, scatter the room, sleeping on towers of vinyl cases. Behind the sofa is a kitchen. Dishes everywhere. The sink is full. She sings along to the song. We are meeting SISSY. Beautiful. Alive and enjoying the fuck out of this song. She is sweating. She plays an imaginary guitar and drums. She knows this song like the back of her hand.

A figure appears in the window. A young woman is attempting to peek inside this living room. She spots SISSY