Daniel Evans and Tamara Harvey’s opening season as co-directors of the RSC continues with a second first. After “a carnival adaptation” of Hanif Kureshi’s novel The Buddha of Suburbia, co-written by the author along with director Emma Rice (and reviewed by my colleague Susannah Clapp), is this European premiere of Sanaz Toossi’s 2023 Pulitzer prize-winning play, English.
Anisha Fields’s set is, unmistakably, a classroom: a frosted-glass wall, neon strip lighting, metal-legged tables, plastic bucket chairs and a whiteboard next to a door. Into the space strides Marjan. Beneath the heading “TOEFL – Test of English as a Foreign Language”, she writes: “English Only”, then underlines the words, once, twice, three times. Lightly played by Nadia Albina, this is deliciously funny. As the action progresses, however, the imperative instruction becomes a motor for identity crises and personality clashes among the characters (who speak English throughout: fluently when communicating in their native Farsi; haltingly in the target language).
