Review: STATEMENTS AFTER AN ARREST UNDER THE IMMORALITY ACT, Orange Tree Theatre

Photo credit: Helen Maybanks

Athol Fugard’s doomed love story is set in South Africa during Apartheid and portrays the strife consequences of following your heart in a regime that punishes you for breaking its corrupted rules. 

Frieda Joubert (played by Scarlett Brookes) and Errol Philander (played by Shaq Taylor) meet at a library where Frieda works, and over time form a bond which progresses into a love affair. As a white woman and black man living under Apartheid, their affair must be kept hidden from their neighbours or else they will face criminal punishment by law which forbids interracial relationships. 

The play opens to a slow start, with an empty stage where a pair of men’s shoes and jeans lie messily waiting for their owner to claim them. Philander and Joubert enter caressing each other, sign posting clearly for the audience that they are new lovers. The first 20 minutes of the play follows their conversation surrounding their relationship, the barriers they face due to their differences; largely Errol’s family, his wife and children, his responsibilities, and restrictions due to his race, verses Frieda’s white privilege. The play begins with a heavy atmosphere which is initially hard to shake. Their relationship seems to lack nuance and detail and rather than being fully fledged characters, at times they feel like archetypes for the political themes that the play wants to communicate. 

However, 30 minutes in, there is a welcome shift in tone and atmosphere with the strong entrance of a new character: Detective Sergeant J. Du Preez (played convincingly by Richard Sutton). He informs the audience as to the crime which has been committed, taking us vividly through how the lover’s affair has been found out. This sequence is cleverly structured with the Detective seamlessly informing the audience with direct address as to the crimes committed, whilst directing accusations and dialogue at Frieda and Errol within the scene also. Sutton takes us through a detailed account of the affair, which it turns out has been given by a woman who essentially has spied on the two. Sutton’s terrifyingly authoritarian speech is underscored by an aggressive motif of flashing lights which assault the senses (designed by Rajiv Pattani) accompanied by the invasive sound of camera flashes (designed by Esther Kehinde Ajayi), which successfully unnerve the audiences by creating a strong voyeuristic and unhinged atmosphere of two people’s privacy being invaded. Brookes and Taylor lie vulnerably on the outskirts of the stage as Sutton accuses the two of their ‘crime’, pulled apart and separated yet again, contrasting with their intertwined proximity in the opening of the play where the lovers are seemingly inseparable. 

Brookes delivers a beautiful monologue in this unnerving scene when she is questioned in court, transitioning between performing the role of the lawyer who interrogates her by invasively demanding a step-by-step account for who initiated the act, suggesting that Errol only slept with her out of ease and her status as a white woman; insinuating that she was not desirable beyond being a status symbol. The dialogue is uncomfortable and Brookes’ reactions as Frieda are heart breaking as she battles the lawyer’s manipulative accusations, instead defending her very human desire to find respite from loneliness in a man whom she found attractive and a connection with on that night. 

Overall, I would have welcomed more moments from the script/production when both Frieda and Errol’s characters have more detailed traits which make their characters more three dimensional, human and engaging, which would also help to inform their relationship and create a stronger connection between the two. For the personal tragedy to be truly felt when they are ripped away from each other by the corrupted state at the end, it would have benefitted from their relationship being set up with more detail in the beginning of the play. More build up is needed of the relationship in the opening, prior to its destruction. Taylor has a strong presence on stage and his final speech is a powerful note to end the play on.

All in all, there were moments of real heart break when audience members were completely engaged and taken into the heart of the play. Certainly, the themes and context bring the tragedy of Apartheid and racial division to the spotlight and it is important that such works bring our attention to, as Page voices, the ongoing relevance of such plays which tragically highlight that history does have the capability of repeating itself, which she emphasises in relation to the alarming events of 2020 and the resulting rise of the Black Rights Matter movement.

An interesting play with important themes, which were executed well at times, but might have benefited from more detailed work on character and a more convincing love connection between the leads. 

*** Three stars

Reviewed by: Viv Williams

Statements After An Arrest Under the Immorality Act plays at the Orange Tree Theatre until 2 October. To book tickets, please click here.