We Are Proud to Present..., The Bush Theatre

The title of Jackie Sibblies Drury's new Bush Theatre production - We Are Proud to Present a Presentation About the Herero of Namibia, Formerly Known as Southwest Africa, From the German Sudwestafrika, Between the Years 1884 - 1915 - is not the only stand-out thing about this playfully provocative new play. We Are Proud to Present... uncovers the story of a little-talked-about genocide in Namibia and what it reveals about racial tensions much closer to home. 

Representing historical atrocities in the arts has long been a vexed ethical chestnut, and Drury’s play tackles the problem from a self-conscious, metatheatrical angle. Set in the rehearsal studio of a  group of well-intentioned actors who are trying  clumsily to tell the story of the massacre of the Herero people in the 1900s, the play provides an interrogative investigation into whether we can know the full extent of what took place. 

The darkness of its subject matter, though, is contrasted with comic relief in the form of narcissistic actors and ridiculous improvisation exercises. It's performed with a remarkable lightness of touch which buoyed up rapt preview audiences until the intense, shattering last scene.

This is the first British production of We Are Proud to Present.... It's h eaded up by director  Gbolahan Obisesan , who having f irst come to prominence as a writer has also been  on the receiving end of considerable broadsheet praise - in the main for the rare sensitivity with which he is able to handle  the grittiest of subject matter. His Fringe First winning play Mad About the Boy sold out at the Bush Theatre in 2011, and in 2009 he won the Young Vic 's Jerwood Award for directing, off the back of a bold and atmospherically charged production of Barrie Keeffe 's Sus .