STEPHANIE BROWN draws attention to the hidden labour of the female embroiderers, and how a 19th century replica made no such error
‘Master Harold’ ... and the boys
National Theatre, London
IN HIS programme notes, Harold Athol Lanigan Fugard describes his 1982 play ‘Master Harold’ … and the boys as “probably the most intensely personal thing I have ever written.”
It’s so personal that he did not even change the names of the characters from that of his own — Hally, the pet name of a young Fugard — or the “two beautiful men” he describes as having ushered him from boyhood to manhood, Sam Semala (Lucian Msamati) and Willie Malopo (Hammed Animashaun).
Sam and Willie were the waiters in the Port Elizabeth tearoom owned by Fugard’s mother, which is beautifully brought to life on the Lyttleton stage by Rajha Shakiry’s delicately detailed design.
PAUL FOLEY revels in the coolest, most joyful piece of theatre you’ll get this summer
MAYER WAKEFIELD has reservations about a two-handed theatrical homage to jazz’s most mercurial musician
MAYER WAKEFIELD is gripped by a production dives rapidly from champagne-quaffing slick to fraying motormouth
ANGUS REID squirms at the spectacle of a bitter millennial on work experience in a gay sauna


