This month I subscribed to National Theatre Home which is a subscription service that costs £9.99 per month and lets you watch National Theatre productions. I really enjoyed the National Theatres production of Small Island by Andrea Levy that they put on YouTube during the lockdown last year so I thought I’d give their subscription service a go. The first thing I watched was Three Sisters which was first performed in 2019.
Three Sisters
by Innau Ellams
After Chekov
The play is set in Nigeria and tells the story of what happened after Nigeria gained Independence from Britain in 1960 and the civil war that ensued between Nigeria and the Independent state of Biafra which existed from 1967-1970. The story is told through three sisters. The eldest is Lolo, a teacher and a revolutionary who knows that Biafra will not succeed as an Independent state. Lolo can see what Britain are doing, helping Nigeria win the war as as a means of maintaining control, a type of neocolonialism. The sins of the British Empire are made clear throughout the play and the blood on their hands is undeniable but Lolo is also critical of how the Biafran and Nigerians alike are both so willing to draw a line in the sand and fight over it when neither really knows what they are fighting for. Nne Chukwu is the middle sister, she’s in a loveless marriage with a schoolmaster that was arranged by her now deceased father when she was still a child, but has an affair with a married Military Commander. The youngest is Udo, the play begins on her birthday, where she is optimistic for the future and the prospect of finding her true purpose, throughout the play we slowly see this optimism dying.
There was so much I really liked about this production, I loved the 60s fashion and hairstyles and the sets were fabulous. I also learned a lot watching this play BUT fair warning, it’s long (nearly 3 hours) and it feels long, I must admit I watched it in a few shifts.
Leave a Reply