Leeds Playhouse – until 9th February 2019
Reviewed By Dawn Smallwood
4****
debbie tucker green’s random first premiered at the Royal Court Theatre, London, in 2008 and is making its debut up North at the Leeds Playhouse’s Pop-Up theatre. Kiza Deen (Sister) stars in this one person play and shares a typical ordinary day in a typical West Indian household until, unbeknown at the time, that a tragedy will change their lives forever.
The script predictably depicts the family’s daily routine including the Sister’s day at work and her sparring relationship with the office. The routine continues until mid-afternoon when an unexpected telephone call prompts the Sister to “Come home, now” and learns the tragedy of her brother who was fatally stabbed.
With knife-crime on the rise in this country it concerns many particularly among young people and this production contextually highlights the personal and social perspectives about it. random is staged centring intimately on the family and the fateful tragic story is told first hand.
tucker green’s poetic and colourful script takes in the account how the media portrays this crime. Sister shares her family’s relationship with the Police (also indirectly to the media) and there seems to be silences, probably of distrust, from the family. The media are wanting a headline story and the authorities is wanting the crime to be systematically solved. Families seemingly aren’t given a timely opportunity to truly express or share how they really feel and how much those tragedies are affecting them.
Deen powerfully and emotively delivers random constituting the family from their monotonous energy of their daily routine to the compelling and changed up emotions from learning about her brothers’ fate and consequential grief. random certainly gives the audience to re-evaluate their conceptions on this ever growing social problem and the deep personal impact it brings.