Theatre review: East Is East

The National Theatre returns to having three auditoria open with a 25th anniversary revival of Ayub Khan Din's East Is East, co-produced with Birmingham Rep. It was of course already a period piece when it premiered, as it's set in 1971 - in part because it's based on the playwright's own upbringing, in part because it means a growing conflict between India and Pakistan over Kashmir dominates the news, and becomes an obsession for George Khan (Tony Jayawardena,) who was Indian when he first emigrated to England before Partition, but now identifies proudly as Pakistani. For his seven children though, finding an identity that they want and that also accepts them, is a lot more complicated. George left a first wife in Pakistan and still sends money back to her, but for the last 25 years he's been married to white Englishwoman Ella (Sophie Stanton,) the mother of all his children, who runs the household as well as the family's fish and chip shop.

We never meet the oldest son, as he left home to become a hairdresser after an argument with his father. George won't have his name spoken in the house, and he doesn't seem to have learned from the experience as he still has very specific expectations of his children - the threat of more of them following their brother out of the door hangs over much of the play.

Iqbal Khan's production is strong in giving distinct personalities to the many Khan children, not all of whom get a lot of onstage time; almost constantly onstage is the youngest son, Sajit (Noah Manzoor,) who's retreated into himself so much he's literally refused to take his parka off for the last year. Maneer (Joeravar Sangha) is the awkward link between the siblings and their father, a devout Muslim the rest consider a snitch, but who struggles to reconcile his religion with the way his father practices it. Saleem (Adonis Jenieco) is an art student pretending to be on an engineering course, and sole daughter Meenah (Amy-Leigh Hickman) is a stroppy teenager everyone else is slightly afraid of.

The central plot revolves around George trying to secretly arrange marriages for Tariq (Gurjeet Singh,) who's on the verge of becoming the next rebel in the family when he finds out, and Abdul (Assad Zaman,) who's been keeping his head down as he can't face the pressure of being the oldest now his brother has left, and having responsibility to look out for his siblings - both from an outside world that doesn't welcome them as much as they might think, and from their own father. And for me this is where Khan's production locates the crux of the play, in the contradictions behind George's behaviour, which is surely the most challenging aspect of the play.

Jayawardena's taking on a role I always think must be incredibly difficult to play, having to balance out a mostly comic story with a character who's always only a breath away from physically or emotionally abusing his family. He gives George a light comic touch that's almost reminiscent of dodgy '70s sitcom representations of South Asian characters, but then fleshing it out with both pathos and a huge dark side. There is a genuine concern behind his hypocritical demands that his children fit the bill of textbook obedient Pakistani Muslims, as it's dangerous for the family to forget that however Westernised they are, society at large won't see them that way; but it's primarily of course an attempt to make up for having strayed so far from it himself in abandoning his first wife and marrying a white woman. It's this inability to practice what he preaches that means he can't hold on to the authority he so desperately craves.

More than just a foil to George, Stanton brings out a side of Ella that from a modern perspective makes her a tragic character, and the main cast is completed by Irvine Iqbal as both Sajit's sympathetic doctor and the grotesquely self-important and condescending Mr Shah, and Rachel Lumberg as Auntie Annie, whose outsider status means she can not-too-subtly drop in some truth bombs to the family. Designing set, lighting and projections, Bretta Gerecke uses the theme of the photos Sajit constantly takes to give an authentically '70s backdrop and help move quickly between locations, while mirroring the auditorium back at itself during the interval to remind us that far too much of this story is still relevant in modern-day Britain. East Is East hit a rich seam of broad comedy with an underlying seriousness and sudden dramatic lurches that made it a hit 25 years ago, and Khan knows the right notes to hit to ensure it still works as well today, while also giving the production enough of its own flavour to make it worth revisiting.

East Is East by Ayub Khan Din is booking until the 30th of October at the National Theatre's Lyttelton.

Running time: 2 hours 15 minutes including interval.

Photo credit: Pamela Raith.