'The Rolling Stone' Orange Tree Theatre ****

What is most perplexing is the fact that in even in the 21^st Century, an astronomical amount of countries still treat homosexuality as a sinful where it is illegal and death penalties can be given to gay men and lesbian women if they are found out due to religious connotations. The Orange Tree Theatre production of Chris Urch’s, ‘The Rolling Stone’ was a thought-provoking and shocking plot about having to keep your sexuality secret so that isn’t exposed to the press, what is more, the depictions are excellently conveyed.

‘The Rolling Stone’ is set in Kampala, Uganda where we’re habituated with Ugandan, Dembe and Irish Ugandan, Sam who have been seeing each other for some time and yet to introduce Sam to Dembe’s family would not be wholeheartedly welcome as you cannot be openly be gay in Uganda as the consequences would be indescribable. There’s a humungous risk as a local publication called, ‘The Rolling Stone’ publically outs gay men and as such this would give a barrage of people an opportunity to hunt them down and savage them, also the whole family for that person would face exile and a possible prison sentence. Over the course of the performance, Dembe and Sam meet each other at a secret location to have their top-secret rendezvous’ as Dembe is concerned by the repercussions of this, on the other hand, are they actually alone or is someone on to their tails already? In order to keep his sexuality private, Dembe has been dating an increasingly muted, Naomi (Faith Alabi) which is probably quite a good strategy as she won’t be able to tell anyone about Dembe hiding in the closet. Namoi’s mother, Mama (Jo Milton) seeks out Joe to heal her daughter from her silence as she along with millions of African people use religion as a way of a form of a remedy. As the story advances, Dembe’s sister, Wummie is intrigued and worried about her brother and questions him over his relationship status and when Dembe musters up the courage to tell his sister that he is gay, she is horrified about what this may do to the reputation of the family and to her brother, Joe’s career as he has just become to local pastor. Sam invited Dembe to move to the UK as he knows that their relationship would be accepted there compared to how it is in Uganda. It appears that Dembe’s name has been listed in ‘The Rolling Stone’ and when Joe realises this when Mama shows him the paper he is repelled by this news; on the contrary, he stands by his brother which is moving to see. At the finale, Dembe, Joe and Wummie are in their house where they are expecting for a large group of homophobic people who are obviously about to drag poor Dembe out of the house where he will be sent to prison and a death penalty may be set.  Urch’s narrative is immensely wondrous as it is clear to see that he has comprehensively researched the topic and to show a relationship that isn’t welcomed by the community shows that there’s not much progress happening in the African continent. 

One found the performances by the company of, ‘The Rolling Stone’ to be fabulously portrayed through impressive voice delivery and movement executions. Fiston Barek is grand as Ugandan gay, Dembe; especially where you can see that he is worried by the fact that his sexuality could be wide-open to the public realm and when it does he is understandably scared by this, also the scenes with Sam was nice to see.  Julian Moore-Cook is terrific as Dembe’s love interest, Sam; principally how his love for Dembe is very much real and how he declares that his life has needed a boost where he is working as an international doctor, plus the awkward moments with Dembe’s sister shows he isn’t liked by his boyfriend’s family. Sule Rimi is splendid as Dembe’e pastor borhter, Joe; specifically where at the church we see how strange and laughable is by the methods that he uses to try to heal people with God’s power and wisdom, in addition to this, when he stands by Dembe in his hour of need shows how much he really loves his brother and this is quite a tender aspect. Faith Omole is tremendous as Dembe’s brash sister, Wummie; expressly when you can see that when it comes to her and her brother gaining a place into medical school that she’ll allow her brother to venture off to it and that she’ll take on a mundane job where her career is never going to be realised. 

Ellen McDougall’s direction is abundant here as she has been able to captivate us into a scenario where I was surprised by how the LGBT community are treated in the African continent, furthermore, the characterisations of the relationship between Dembe and Sam shows what could be so sweet and cute, but due to the foreseen circumstances in Uganda it is impossible. Joanna Scotcher’s set and costume designs are marvellous as with the in-the-round staging configuration you can be transported to the Ugandan environment and this is done quite simplistically but effective too and the costumes work to the contemporary time period. Overall, the experience of, ‘The Rolling Stone’ was a bold statement that suggests that more progress is needed to countries who put the death penalty on innocent people who love people of the same gender and this shows an outdated society especially from Uganda.