What are the themes of your play?
I would implore us to experience art as mirrors- it could mean different things for different people. I thought the play was about one thing when I first started to write it and now I have no idea. Love, that’s what it is about love. The lack of it, the drowning in it, the temperature of it, the thickness and smell of it. How it can feel and taste. Where it comes from. How we grow it. What happens when it’s too hot or cold. What it needs. What love deserves.
Why did you write it and why now?
It is my first play. I wrote it because I was trying to make sense and peace with the questions I had at a particular time. I think I started to write because I was angry. I then became angry and curious. Now because if not now, then?
Which playwrights are you influenced by and why?
debbie tucker green because she was the first playwright whose work made me want to write something. Anything. green let me know I could create songs on a page complete with a chorus and bridge. Winsome Pinnock because her artistry with language is profound and feels ancestral. Somalia Seaton because her play House was the first play I read when I read someone write the way I talk in real life. I realised I could absolutely write how I speak exactly and not apologise for it. Her play Crowning Glory is a masterpiece. And lastly, man like Bola Agbaje, our east London empress of the art. The impact of Gone to Far, the play, is astounding. Bola spoke about colourism, internalised anti-Africanness, and diaspora wars from a Black British lens from early. Queen among Kings.
What do you want to achieve as a playwright?
I would like to achieve happiness, health and healing as a playwright.