I have always assumed that one chief sign of a strong dramatist was instant recognisability. Yet Ryan Calais Cameron is proving his talent by showing how elastic it is. His astonishing For Black Boys Who Have Considered Suicide When the Hue Gets Too Heavy, now wowing the West End, is intense, inward – and danced as much as spoken. His new play is utterly different: socially engaged, skilfully recreating a historic encounter and driven by rapid-fire dialogue.
Opening in the week of Harry Belafonte’s death, Amit Sharma’s fleet production of Retrograde strikes with particular force. Set in the 50s, the action draws on the real-life hounding of black actors during the McCarthyite era, in particular the pressure – essentially, do this or you won’t work – put on Sidney Poitier to denounce the glorious singer, actor and campaigner Paul Robeson.
