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The review is from the Arcola Theatre in November 2018. ‘The Fishermen’ transfers to Trafalgar Studios 2 in September 2019
Back for another bite at the Arcola apple after a buzzy but brief run in September, Gbolahan Obisesan’s adaptation of Chigozie Obioma’s ‘The Fishermen’ literally crams a novel’s worth of plot into a little over an hour.
This is kind of both a good thing and a bad thing. Condensing Obioma’s Man Booker Prize-shortlisted book into such a short time makes for an explosively exciting and action packed piece of theatre, that is often terrifically smartly staged by director Jack McNamara. At the same time, good as actors Michael Ajao and Valentine Olukoga are, they have so much ground to cover, so many roles to play, in such little time, that I felt like I was spending a lot of the show desperately trying to work out what had happened in the last scene.
We meet Ben (Ajao) and Obembe (Olukoga) as two adult brothers, presumably in the small Nigerian village in whiich the grew up. Standing on the two halves of Amelia Jane Hankin’s yin yang stage, separated by a trembling wall of metal, their relationship is clearly strained; they have not seen each other in a long time.
Soon, though, they begin to reminisce - and reenact - pivotal events from their childhood, the latter part of which they spent fishing with their two older brothers. The ill advised trip to make a catch in a polluted river. The terrible fight between their older brothers. An attempt at honouring a prophecy that blots both of their lives.
Written down like that it doesn’t sound like so much, but the pure kinetic energy of the play doesn’t always translate into clarity of storytelling. It’s not always immediately obvious which characters Ajao and Olukoga they were being, and major plot points are blasted through at such speed that it takes a while to entirely grasp their significance.
But that’s kind of what you get when you condense an entire novel into an Edinburgh Fringe-friendly length (the show played there this summer following it premiere in Manchester). If you know the book, I suspect you’re in for a treat. If you don’t, it’ll still reel you in – but I’d be willing to bet a half-hour-longer version would be palpably more potent.