All photos: Lizzie Henshaw

Elayne Ogbeta’s warm, pleasing and thoughtful show for ages 4-9 manages to pack in more layers than a good strudel.

Predicated partly on Black History Month it presents Grandad (Marcus Hercules) and his primary school age granddaughter, Abi (Jazmine Wilkinson) in his garden. Like everything else in this show, the garden designed by Sorcha Corcoran, is beautiful with lots of colour, light and plants that Grandad knows by name and talks to. One of the many layers in this show is botanical with words like “perennial” casually thrown in.

Story telling, and its extraordinary power, is at the centre of the piece because Grandad and Abi,  who really love each other, are bonded by the Anansi stories which they share and act out, improvising with items lying about in the garden – with lots of humour and pleasure. Another theme is migration because Grandad has come, originally, from Jamaica and hankers for its sound, sunshine, smells and colour. He is planning to return but struggles to tell Abi this so the play is also about loss, change and letting go.

Hercules brings a certain venerability to Grandad although he’s also lithe and lively especially when Abi is teaching him to dance. This is a good actor playing decades above his actual age but none of the children in the rapt school groups I saw it with will have noticed. And his colourful costume (designed by Zoey Barnes) is a delight.

Wilkinson’s performance is strong and convincing too. She has all the gestures, mannerisms and body language of a 9 year old but also segues effortlessly into Jamaican Patois for the telling of the Anansi stories which are verse so they flow along. There is also music by Tayo Akinbode and parts of the stories are sung.

And as for the title, the conceit is that Grandad is himself just like the clever, mischievous part-man, part-spider Anansi. He’s certainly charismatic in Hercules’s hands and of course Abi and her mum will be able to visit him in his new home. “It’s only a plane ride away” as he tells her.

This show is touring nationwide until 30 October

First published by Sardines: https://www.sardinesmagazine.co.uk/review/grandad-anansi/

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  Photos: Lizzie Henshaw

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