...Adekoluejo’s performance wins out. No matter how stunned and small she sometimes seems, Simpson-Pike’s direction ensures Adekoluejo is always in command.
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Benedict Lombe's debut Lava covers a lot of ground, in both literal and metaphorical senses...It is a brisk and exciting play, with a firm sense of adventure throughout.
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Anthony Simpson-Pike’s kinetic production often feels more like a freeform poetic eruption than a sculpted piece of drama. But Adékoluejo is such a titanic presence she sort of irons out the kinks by charisma alone.
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Lava levels some discomfiting accusations about white ignorance of and complacency around Europe’s colonial history – and it ends up calling for a spirit of black resistance to prevail.
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It’s stunningly performed by Ronkẹ Adékoluẹjo. And in a week when racism was laid bare in the UK, but barely discomfited those who enable it, Lava feels shamingly timely.
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My concern about Lava is that while it airs a valuable life-story that bears the bruises of history, and attests to Lombe’s way with words, it fosters an “us and them” spirit just as we’re all coming out of scarring isolation.
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Ronkẹ Adékoluẹjo is luminous in Benedict Lombe’s passionate memoir-monologue that weaves lyrical storytelling with untiring protest.
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