Elmina's Kitchen

This show has now closed, click here for a listing of current and future London shows

Play Opened 26 April 2005, Closed 23 July 2005

Garrick Theatre Charing Cross Road, London

Elmina's Kitchen is a darkly hilarious firecracker of a play written by Casualty actor and star of Celebrity Fame Academy Kwame Kwei-Armah.

"A gripping, scorching drama. Shattering" The Daily Telegraph

Kwame plays 'Deli', an ex-boxer and desperate father, attempting to make an honest living and trying to hold both his business and family together. Whilst searching for the winning formula to make his Caribbean café a success, he tries to keep his son away from the lure of Hackney's 'murder mile'. But in a place where acceptance comes on four wheels and respect through the barrel of a gun, how can a man save his son from temptation? Note: The play contains strong language and scenes of a violent nature.

"Kwame Kwei-Armah writes exquisitely, in a language that is peppery, poetic and full of wit. This is an angry, provocative, vital play" The Guardian

"Set in London's contemporary East End, Elmina's Kitchen is an assured, humorous, ultimately grim drama by Kwame Kwei-Armah (best known as Finlay the paramedic from BBC1's Casualty)... Kwei-Armah has a terrific ear for vibrant street talk - a mix of patois and cockney vowels that's exhilarating close-up. He simultaneously constructs an overarching narrative structure with a forceful final twist." The Independent

"Passionate, raw and very funny" Time Out Magazine

"After a sell-out run at the National in 2003, this new production of Elmina's Kitchen, with writer Kwame Kwei-Armah now in the lead as Deli, has lost none of its force. The first half is too slow and the swaggering machismo can be alienating. But the writing in act two is thrillingly taut. Kwei-Armah gives a performance of real dignity, and there is great interplay between the older male characters - it's lovely to see a modern piece that isn't just obsessed with youth." The Observer

"Initially, Kwei-Armah plays for laughs, relying heavily on the affability of the older generation... and the foxy friskiness of Dona Kroll as a single mother who offers Deli love and a chance to brighten up his fusty kitchen... All this is easy-going stuff - so easygoing the play takes an age to hit its stride... In the second half, though, the director, Angus Jackson, ratchets up the tension and a litany of betrayals and blackmail leads to a harrowing coup de theatre that had the first night audience on its feet in ecstatic applause. Too much, perhaps, for a flawed, baggy play, though one whose vigour just about wins the day." The Sunday Telegraph