Sometimes, the day just is not going for you.
Things happen, problems get in the way, and it can feel like the universe is conspiring against you. It is this calamitous chaos that forms the backdrop of Tia-Renée Mullings’s new play, A To B, where preparations for a blind date for two South London black creatives go as badly as you can possibly imagine.
Going from A to B are Amani (Sheyi Cole) and Brianna (Zakiyyah Deen). Amani, a poet, initially arrives under the guise of terrific male bravado, shining in his freshly pressed clothes, sharp trim, and his ‘wedding Air Force Ones’, with his gentle arrogance drawing out great humour from the start. Amani’s pride is neatly contrasted to the unsure Brianna, whose character, awaiting therapy for anxiety in a plotline not so thoroughly explored, battles twists in her hair, sisters stealing her clothes, and a mother who wants her to sweep up.
The pair have not yet met. It is a blind date set up by their friends, and a date that provokes much panic and excitement within the pair. Yet, over the course of the play’s 80 minutes, both characters overcome increasingly more outlandish trials and tribulations, from being splatted in bird poo, attacked with water pistols, and, potentially, rescuing their Nan from kidnappers, which all cause preparations for the date to wobble, and even jeopardise it from happening at all.
Mullings’s debut play, A To B, is very much geared up for a South London audience. The characters slip neatly into colloquial dialect that feels instantly authentic, while battles with the Windrush overground line and recognisable locations all quickly draw knowing audiences in.
As the pair in this two-hander, Cole and Deen thrive in evoking the mess that unfolds around their respective characters. Cole is excellent in bringing out Amani’s boyish charm, yet when this is toppled by a disastrous new trim, the vulnerability of a young man whose personality hinges on anxieties about his appearance is neatly explored. Meanwhile, Deen is energetic as Brianna and excels too in multi-rolling, especially during brilliant exchanges between Amani and his disastrous barber. Yet, much like Cole, it is during Brianna’s more vulnerable moments that provoke the most intrigue.
Yet, it is also a production which is trying to do a little too much. At 80 minutes, you would expect the piece to fizz by, yet the first half hour meanders a little, threatening to be bogged down by the characters’ parallel timings and a bit too much exposition, which feels repetitive. Once both characters leave their respective houses, the play’s momentum and their chaotic circumstances pick up. Still, ironically, the piece takes a little too long to get to its direction of travel.
Nevertheless, if you stick with the piece and lean into its dafter moments, Ewa Dina’s direction pays off with some great comedic moments and a sweet, brief conclusion which neatly wraps it all together. A To B is a story about love and potential between two young black Londoners, but it focuses more on the ‘will they, won’t they’ of getting to the date, rather than the date itself.
A fun piece, with lofty ambitions and an even loftier sense of heart.
This review was originally written for Adventures in Theatreland (AD/PR Invite)
