Theatre review: Marriage Material

Split between the late 1960s and the present day in Wolverhampton, Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti's Marriage Material, based on Sathnam Sanghera's 2013 novel, makes a connection between the politics of the two times that's hard to miss: In the first act, Enoch Powell's "rivers of blood" speech is still fresh in everyone's memories, both the white racists who felt emboldened by it, and the immigrant communities who had to deal with the consequences. In the second act there's no single obvious instigator mentioned, but disenfranchised young white men are once again being encouraged to blame their problems on anyone with a different skin colour. These scenes are hard to miss, and they provide an important background to everything that happens to the central characters. What's impressive though is how this comes across without ever becoming what the story is really about.

Instead we get an intimate but expansive family saga beginning with Mr and Mrs Bains (Jaz Singh Deol and Avita Jay,) who moved from India to Wolverhampton to open a corner shop (Good Teeth's set design nicely twisting and permutating itself into the shop and house.)

They have two daughters, and the local Sikh community isn't necessarily shy about telling them their lack of a son is a grave misfortune, but their father calls youngest daughter Surinder (Anouskha Desmukh) his son anyway. She's considered the prettier sister and is by far the cleverest, and has aspirations to make a life for herself outside of the family's expectations. But when her father dies and it looks like she'll be expected to drop her education and enter an arranged marriage, she looks for a way out, and thinks she's found it in sales rep Jim (Tommy Belshaw, who's so exactly the image of the '60s wide-boy twink it's surprising he's not in black and white.)

Deol returns in the second act as his own grandson Arjan, son of elder sister Kamaljit (Kiran Landa.) He's made a life in London but after his own father's death he feels drawn back to helping his mother keep the shop going, which puts a strain on his relationship with fiancée Claire (Celeste Dodwell.) While there he also discovers some surprising truths about his long-lost aunt Surinder.

Iqbal Khan directs a play that has definite shades of another play he's previously directed, East Is East - particularly in the scenes where it seems the parents are demanding their daughters lead more insular Indian lives than the ones they themselves have left India to build. But if anything it has an even lighter touch than Ayub Khan Din's play, often threatening to go to dark places but always bringing it back to comedy from the brink of tragedy - even, in the case of Arjan and his combative friend Ranjit (Omar Malik,) turning from potential violence into slapstick.

So Irfan Shamji's affable Uncle Dhanda takes a bit of a creepy turn near the end of the first act, but while never quite a trustworthy character he does contribute to the second's theme of redemption and reunion. (Although I do find this casting a bit worrying - Shamji's one of our most versatile and surprising actors, can we try not to lose him to comedy uncle typecasting just yet?)

It's all part of a general theme of Sanghera seeing the good in even the most antagonistic, unpleasant characters that gives the play a genuinely optimistic note, and means it transcends that political background it plays against. It's also often funny - I liked the running gag of aspiring poet Jim occasionally veering into a Welsh accent when he's trying to emulate his idol Dylan Thomas. It all ends, appropriately enough given the title, in a big wedding dance, and the genuine heart of what's come before means the indulgence feels earned.

Marriage Material by Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti, based on the novel by Sathnam Sanghera, is booking until the 21st of June at the Lyric Hammersmith; and from the 25th of June to the 5th of July at Birmingham Rep.

Running time: 2 hours 45 minutes including interval.

Photo credit: Helen Murray.