DINNER THEATRE BY MUMBI KAIGWA & CO

Dinner theatre set to make entry into Kenya

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Jethii (right) waits on the family in Johari Five’s play Nyama Ndoge (Poison Meat). Photo/Margaretta wa Gacheru  

By Margaretta wa Gacheru

Posted  Thursday, May 22  2014 at  17:40

inShareDinner theatre isn’t something often done in Nairobi unlike other global cities where it is common practice to combine a yummy meal with an entertaining show.

That is what Mumbi Kaigwa, of The Arts Canvas, and Katy Bingham have decided to do on Thursday May 29 night starting from 6:30pm at the Westhouse Hotel situated on the edge of Karura Forest.

The seasoned professional actors have assembled a great cast to perform five short plays, two comedies — 4am (Open all Night) and The Story of Cinderella — and three dramas — Ladies and Gentlemen, The Rain, Enter the Spokeswoman, Gently and Early Blight — that they’ll present after the soup and main course of the meal.

Dessert and coffee will then come after the 45 minute showcase of local stars including Kaz Lucas (currently starring in Zuku TV’s new political drama State House), Gakunju Kaigwa, Steve Murua and Ms Kaigwa as well as Renaud Gautier, Djorf Amirouche and Ms Bingham.

It’s best to book early as the dining room at Westhouse comfortably seats around 70 and has just 15 tables.

If the public responds well to this first round of dinner theatre, The Arts Canvas promises to present more short snappy plays.

Meanwhile, Duets by Peter Quilter opens tonight at the Phoenix Theatre. The comedy directed by Nick Njache tells the stories of four couples all involved in radically different kinds of relationships.

Featuring only four in the cast —Lucy Mwangi, Trizah Wahinya, Gibson Ndaiga and Martin Kigondu — Duets will pose a challenge to the actors who are being double cast, but all four should be up for it as we shall see between tonight and June 8.

Phoenix has a new policy in that they’ll perform Saturdays and Sundays, which should be a popular decision once the public catches on.

Finally, Johari Five’s Nyama Ndoge (Poisoned Meat) is so much more than a mere comedy. It is a flaming social commentary that shines a spotlight on many of our current ills, from cop corruption to husband beaters who abuse their men both physically and psychologically to ‘Countryman’ booze that kills without regard for gender or age.

Even the grave robbers who steal jewellery and clothes as well as coffins and body parts are exposed in Nyama Ndoge.

Yet Johari Five doesn’t just mirror these flagrant social ills; they twist them (as when the grave robbers are actually ‘dead’) revealing just how much impunity has taken hold not only among the police (who bully the public for bribes) but even in the home where Jethii (Lawrence Murage) is badly beaten regularly by his wife (Ann Kamau) and ridiculed by his children.

Scripted collectively by the cast, including producer Josephine Gacheru and director Trizah Kabue (who’s so versatile she plays a daughter, an old mama and a dead woman who was stabbed to death by her spouse), I watched Nyama Ndoge in the Little Theatre of the Kenya Cultural Centre last weekend.

The story itself revolves around Jethii, a humble father of six, long-suffering spouse and posho mill worker who’s cruelly brow-beaten by everyone in his family, including his children whose nasty behaviour mirrors the meanness of their mom.

After being driven to drink, Jethii dies after imbibing the lethal brew Countryman, but he’s vindicated after he leaves all his wealth (where it came from we don’t know) to a rehab centre and a children’s home.
 When his wife comes to his grave, she confesses she ‘never loved him’ and only married him (for 25 painful) years for his money. Now a pauper having expected to get a fat inheritance from Jethii, she’s filled with self-pity, not remorse.

From the grave Jethii is finally able to tell her what he never could in his lifetime. He’s unapologetic about leaving her nothing and nobody blames him.

But Nyama Ndoge doesn’t end on a sober note. Instead, the dead are just as funny as the living, like when the graveyard occupants have to cope with ‘the General’ who steals body parts and ‘sells’ them to the dead who need a limb or internal organ.

It sounds absurd but Johari Five have worked together long enough to have mastered the art of witty improvisation and this is a talent they employ well in this play.

One of the sweetest surprises of Nyama Ndoge was the acappella singing by the cast whose soprano Wangari Gioche has an exquisite voice. The other musicians who dazzled were the curtain raisers, H_art the Band.

But by far, the most outrageous scene in the show was when the three posho millers, including Jethii, danced shirtless and sweaty for the women, emulating the notorious new music video by Sauti Sol.