Beru Tessema’s slice-of-family-life debut play, set in the aftermath of an addict’s untimely demise has fantastic dialogue and great performances throughout.
7 May 2022
Ife, the titular character in Beru Tessema’s impressive debut work, is dead.
Estranged from his family and engulfed in crack addiction, Ife’s passing was as predictable as it was painful. As his funeral and its aftermath unfolds, the long shadow of the young man’s death hangs over his family, bringing long-buried antagonism and perilous conflict to the surface. Betrayal is in the air.
Burdened by the intense summer heat and confined together in a small council flat in the Ns, how will this family deal with the aftermath of Ife’ s death and what is at stake for each of them?
This may sound like a small story and in many ways, it is, although there are universal themes of love, loyalty, and treachery it its veins.
What makes House of Ife big and bold are the vividly believable characters writer Beru Tessema and director Lynette Linton throw into the mix, and the author’s richly textured naturalistic dialogue that echoes with the cadences, idioms, and nuances of North London.
Tessema writes the language that you hear in Finsbury Park, or on the 76 bus, but infuses it with the kind of lyrical subtext the good actors can inhabit, explore, and bring vividly to life. As the cast here is uniformly superb, the outcome is as successful a debut drama as I have seen in a very long time.
The characterisation too is sympathetic, likeable, and believable.
Absent father Solomon, who portrays himself as a man of God but is really an inveterate liar, left the family eight years ago to become a Pastor in Addis. His new young family in Africa need some space to grow up in and Solomon has plans to provide it.
In Dad’s absence, Mum, and matriarch, Meron, played with dignified forbearance by Sarah Priddy, has raised the family, and is not alogether overjoyed about dad’s impending return visit for Ife’s funeral.
Ife’s twin, Aida, cleverly played by a sparkling Karla-Simone Spence, is a talented artist with an exhibition just about to open at the Whitechapel Gallery. She could not be much more different from her deceased twin if she tried and is troubled by survivor’s guilt knowing it was she, not Ife, who successfully navigated the cultural challenges of growing up Ethiopian in London.
Younger sister Tsion, played with charisma by Yohanna Ephrem, is training to be a primary school teacher, but dreams about a return to Ethiopia to teach local kids in the house her father gifted to the four siblings. Younger brother Yosi, played by Michael Workeye in the work’s standout performance, stocks shelves in Sainsbury’s and studies English Literature, but his real dreams are of being a rap artist.
Without giving away too much, I can safely say that we get an inkling things are not going to work out for the grieving family when dad has to borrow money from Tsion for a ticket home. There is duplicity afoot that is going to strain the family’s ties almost to destruction.
Highly recommended.
Writer Beru Tessema
Director Lynette Linton
Cast
Solomon Jude Akuwudike
Tsion Yohanna Ephrem
Meron Sarah Priddy
Aida Karla-Simone Spence
Yosi Michael Workeye
Duration 2 hours no interval
Full Disclosure: I paid full box-office price for the ticket.
