Fela and his queens on the London stage
The corridors of Olivier Hall of The National Theatre, South Bank, London was crowded on the evening of November 16, when I arrived just minutes short of the start of the musical, Fela!. It was the opening night of the critically acclaimed Broadway production, which had already bagged three Tony awards and was much talked about in international thespian circles.
It is not often that an African personality is celebrated and chosen as a subject for western theatre; therefore the excitement was palpable as this evening marked its next step: a debut in London's Theatreland - and the British media were out in their numbers to appraise this curious collaboration of American stagecraft and African music.
Songs by Fela played softly from hidden speakers around the busy corridors of the hall, seducing us to a state of ecstatic anticipation. The songs interrupted frequently by recorded voice simulations of Fela urging that the motley audience take their seats as the show was set to begin. We finally made our way from the small talk, the bars and the sales stalls offering Fela merchandise and trickled to our seats.
The Olivier had transmuted into a world of colours, symbols and images. Grabbing attention high up on the right wing of the hall was a giant portrait of Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, Fela's mother. The stall terraces were draped with flags of various African countries. The stage background was a blown up image of Kalakuta Republic, while the foreground paid homage to many traditional deities: Oshun, Shango, Esu, Ogun and Yemoja.
Projected pages of newpapers proclaimed news like ‘Fela Raided in Ghana', ‘Let's legalise polygamy - Fela'; and the many scrolling, flashing and shifting stage accoutrements that were scattered above the stage ensured that one did not quite know where to look. The stage set was a tribute to excess - oddly fitting in depicting the life of a musical legend who was known to have been ruled by extreme passions.
Preceded by his beautifully decorated dancers, who taxed their waists and derrieres in seductive dances that left many in the crowd gasping at the audacity of their ample behinds, Sahr Ngaujah swaggered onstage and promptly took the thousand-strong audience down a headlong dive into the life of Abami Eda from the first strains of ‘Upside Down'.
Unknown Soldier
We watch with wistful appreciation his devotion to his mother, whom he praises as "the first (Nigerian) woman to drive a car... the first to visit China... The Teacher" and we mourn along with him in pin-drop silence after her death at the hands of ‘Unknown Soldier'. We accompany him when, evoking the spirit of his mother, he summons an Egungun who leads him by the hand to seek her in the world of the spirits. And along with him feel the reprimand of her pronouncement when he begs to abandon the homeland: "I refuse to give my permission for you to use what happened to me as an excuse to run away."
We are acquainted uncomfortably - considering the British audience - with his long-held scorn for those he calls Nigeria's "tea drinking guests, the ones who take our petroleum and people and leave us with gonorrhoea and Jesus." And together we are pallbearers who carry gifts of ‘Coffin for Head of State'.
When the musical seems to double back on itself, we accompany Fela on his musical education to grey, cold London and sympathise when he wallows in what might be termed a quarter life crisis. We all discover his identity in Black emancipated Los Angeles, learning at the feet of Sandra who is as much a political influence on him as Malcolm X and Eldridge Cleaver whose texts she plies him with. And we share his triumph when he declares, "Music is about change and I'm going to change the world."
Complemented by a 12-piece band - with London-based Afrobeat musician, Dele Dosimi, on the keyboard - and two lead singers who played the two major influences in Fela's life Melanie Marshall (Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti) with her steely soprano, and Paulette Ivory (Sandra Isadore) crooning in sultry alto, Ngaujah sweated his way through several saxophone build-ups, while exuding the megalomania and larger than life charisma of Fela. He played the audience expertly, we laughed when he wanted and danced when he ordered. He took us from raucous participation in the notorious pelvic thrusting clock dance to sad contemplation of the still-bitter state of affairs in the nation he tried so hard to change.
Shuffering and Shmilling
‘Water No Get Enemy', ‘Coffin for Head of State', ‘Expensive Shit', ‘Upside Down', ‘Shuffering and Shmiling', ‘Sorrow Tears and Blood', ‘Zombie', ‘Yellow Fever', led us down route after intriguing route in the life of the much missed icon. Finally, Ngaujah asked, "Who here has ever been to jail?" and surprisingly several hands shot up in the audience.
Two of the more insistent hands came from the first and fifth rows, and moments later, stage lighting revealed them to be no other than Fela's sons, Seun and Femi Kuti. Seated discreetly among the crowd with his older sister, Yeni, Femi had undoubtedly tried to evade recognition until the nostalgia of the recreated shrine ambience prompted him to abandon anonymity. Seun on the other hand had hardly been able to restrain himself from joining Ngaujah and the dancers onstage. His head bobbed, shoulders shook, and feet tapped in evident enjoyment of the music and the bird's eye view of the spectacular dancers gyrating before him in an alternation of perfect choreography and reckless abandon.
Employing a colourful array of costumes, expressions, dances, ideas, Fela! was spectacular in its drama. Bearing in mind its international audience, however, many of the songs were performed in English rather than the Pidgin English. The musical also played, as it were with the facts: Fela was no known Abiku, who had eschewed his mortality in anger at being given a foreign name. Yeni, was quick to defend these add-ons when NEXT caught up with her after the show, "It's a musical, they can't get all the facts right. You will not find me criticising it because it has ensured that almost 14 years after his death, Fela's legacy continues to live internationally."
After curtain call
The performance seemed to be packed too tight on a body too thin, getting lost in the hazy area between drama and musical. Nigerians may not have seen all of the Fela they know, but the parts of Fela seen fit to be depicted was played out in almost an overdose. "The story is flimsy and confused, there's a lack of narrative drive," complained Henry Hitchings of The London Evening Standard, and one could not agree more. One might therefore disagree with Femi Kuti's remark that "This show is for the international audience. It gives the average foreigner knowledge of Fela and what he stood for. We Nigerians are too critical; we want the Nigerian accent and fail to understand the intention of the producers."
Seun Kuti who was seeing the musical for the seventh time, said he found it enjoyable though less heightened than the Broadway shows. "Not in the message," he hastened to add, "but in the drama."
Watching Ngaujah alternate between abrasive confidence, soul and affected contempt for his "political enemies" was a thrill only slightly marred by his mispronunciation of Yoruba expressions. And one could not help but wonder, as he appeared in one elaborately embroidered Fela trademarked costume after the other, whether this job of playing Fela could not be better delivered by D'banj, whose new Mr Endowed mantra seems another of his similarities with the illustrious "one who carries death in his pouch".
Enquiring from Femi if when Fela! debuts in Nigeria as hoped, D'banj would be playing Fela, met with a bright eyed knowledge but a refusal to comment, and one can only wonder whether the Koko Master is not as we speak taking a crash course in playing the brass.
Fela! at London's National Theatre is an exhilarating testament to the achievement of Fela Anikulapo-Kuti while being at the same time exaggerated yet sketchy; toned down, as it were, to appeal to British sensibilities. One therefore hopes that when the musical visits Nigeria, the Abami Eda will be unleashed on his people in all his overwhelming glory.
Source:234next.com
It is not often that an African personality is celebrated and chosen as a subject for western theatre; therefore the excitement was palpable as this evening marked its next step: a debut in London's Theatreland - and the British media were out in their numbers to appraise this curious collaboration of American stagecraft and African music.
Songs by Fela played softly from hidden speakers around the busy corridors of the hall, seducing us to a state of ecstatic anticipation. The songs interrupted frequently by recorded voice simulations of Fela urging that the motley audience take their seats as the show was set to begin. We finally made our way from the small talk, the bars and the sales stalls offering Fela merchandise and trickled to our seats.
The Olivier had transmuted into a world of colours, symbols and images. Grabbing attention high up on the right wing of the hall was a giant portrait of Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, Fela's mother. The stall terraces were draped with flags of various African countries. The stage background was a blown up image of Kalakuta Republic, while the foreground paid homage to many traditional deities: Oshun, Shango, Esu, Ogun and Yemoja.
Projected pages of newpapers proclaimed news like ‘Fela Raided in Ghana', ‘Let's legalise polygamy - Fela'; and the many scrolling, flashing and shifting stage accoutrements that were scattered above the stage ensured that one did not quite know where to look. The stage set was a tribute to excess - oddly fitting in depicting the life of a musical legend who was known to have been ruled by extreme passions.
Preceded by his beautifully decorated dancers, who taxed their waists and derrieres in seductive dances that left many in the crowd gasping at the audacity of their ample behinds, Sahr Ngaujah swaggered onstage and promptly took the thousand-strong audience down a headlong dive into the life of Abami Eda from the first strains of ‘Upside Down'.
Unknown Soldier
We watch with wistful appreciation his devotion to his mother, whom he praises as "the first (Nigerian) woman to drive a car... the first to visit China... The Teacher" and we mourn along with him in pin-drop silence after her death at the hands of ‘Unknown Soldier'. We accompany him when, evoking the spirit of his mother, he summons an Egungun who leads him by the hand to seek her in the world of the spirits. And along with him feel the reprimand of her pronouncement when he begs to abandon the homeland: "I refuse to give my permission for you to use what happened to me as an excuse to run away."
We are acquainted uncomfortably - considering the British audience - with his long-held scorn for those he calls Nigeria's "tea drinking guests, the ones who take our petroleum and people and leave us with gonorrhoea and Jesus." And together we are pallbearers who carry gifts of ‘Coffin for Head of State'.
When the musical seems to double back on itself, we accompany Fela on his musical education to grey, cold London and sympathise when he wallows in what might be termed a quarter life crisis. We all discover his identity in Black emancipated Los Angeles, learning at the feet of Sandra who is as much a political influence on him as Malcolm X and Eldridge Cleaver whose texts she plies him with. And we share his triumph when he declares, "Music is about change and I'm going to change the world."
Complemented by a 12-piece band - with London-based Afrobeat musician, Dele Dosimi, on the keyboard - and two lead singers who played the two major influences in Fela's life Melanie Marshall (Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti) with her steely soprano, and Paulette Ivory (Sandra Isadore) crooning in sultry alto, Ngaujah sweated his way through several saxophone build-ups, while exuding the megalomania and larger than life charisma of Fela. He played the audience expertly, we laughed when he wanted and danced when he ordered. He took us from raucous participation in the notorious pelvic thrusting clock dance to sad contemplation of the still-bitter state of affairs in the nation he tried so hard to change.
Shuffering and Shmilling
‘Water No Get Enemy', ‘Coffin for Head of State', ‘Expensive Shit', ‘Upside Down', ‘Shuffering and Shmiling', ‘Sorrow Tears and Blood', ‘Zombie', ‘Yellow Fever', led us down route after intriguing route in the life of the much missed icon. Finally, Ngaujah asked, "Who here has ever been to jail?" and surprisingly several hands shot up in the audience.
Two of the more insistent hands came from the first and fifth rows, and moments later, stage lighting revealed them to be no other than Fela's sons, Seun and Femi Kuti. Seated discreetly among the crowd with his older sister, Yeni, Femi had undoubtedly tried to evade recognition until the nostalgia of the recreated shrine ambience prompted him to abandon anonymity. Seun on the other hand had hardly been able to restrain himself from joining Ngaujah and the dancers onstage. His head bobbed, shoulders shook, and feet tapped in evident enjoyment of the music and the bird's eye view of the spectacular dancers gyrating before him in an alternation of perfect choreography and reckless abandon.
Employing a colourful array of costumes, expressions, dances, ideas, Fela! was spectacular in its drama. Bearing in mind its international audience, however, many of the songs were performed in English rather than the Pidgin English. The musical also played, as it were with the facts: Fela was no known Abiku, who had eschewed his mortality in anger at being given a foreign name. Yeni, was quick to defend these add-ons when NEXT caught up with her after the show, "It's a musical, they can't get all the facts right. You will not find me criticising it because it has ensured that almost 14 years after his death, Fela's legacy continues to live internationally."
After curtain call
The performance seemed to be packed too tight on a body too thin, getting lost in the hazy area between drama and musical. Nigerians may not have seen all of the Fela they know, but the parts of Fela seen fit to be depicted was played out in almost an overdose. "The story is flimsy and confused, there's a lack of narrative drive," complained Henry Hitchings of The London Evening Standard, and one could not agree more. One might therefore disagree with Femi Kuti's remark that "This show is for the international audience. It gives the average foreigner knowledge of Fela and what he stood for. We Nigerians are too critical; we want the Nigerian accent and fail to understand the intention of the producers."
Seun Kuti who was seeing the musical for the seventh time, said he found it enjoyable though less heightened than the Broadway shows. "Not in the message," he hastened to add, "but in the drama."
Watching Ngaujah alternate between abrasive confidence, soul and affected contempt for his "political enemies" was a thrill only slightly marred by his mispronunciation of Yoruba expressions. And one could not help but wonder, as he appeared in one elaborately embroidered Fela trademarked costume after the other, whether this job of playing Fela could not be better delivered by D'banj, whose new Mr Endowed mantra seems another of his similarities with the illustrious "one who carries death in his pouch".
Enquiring from Femi if when Fela! debuts in Nigeria as hoped, D'banj would be playing Fela, met with a bright eyed knowledge but a refusal to comment, and one can only wonder whether the Koko Master is not as we speak taking a crash course in playing the brass.
Fela! at London's National Theatre is an exhilarating testament to the achievement of Fela Anikulapo-Kuti while being at the same time exaggerated yet sketchy; toned down, as it were, to appeal to British sensibilities. One therefore hopes that when the musical visits Nigeria, the Abami Eda will be unleashed on his people in all his overwhelming glory.
Source:234next.com
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