Brightly coloured curtains hang behind painted step-stools, Hindi film songs play from the speakers. An apt stage setting for a play about South Asian stereotypes.
Four brown girls gather for an audition. In an industry where the character choices for a South Asian actor are between “funny best friend”, “wedding guest” or “Bollywood dancer”, this here is a meaty role – to play Priti Patel.
With the auditions delayed, the four find themselves with a lot of time to kill. In the forced proximity of that confined space they go from being rivals to building a sisterhood, brought together by the realities of growing up brown.
Written by Kaya Uppal (who also plays one of the young women) and directed by Zarshaa Ismail, the play is a tapestry of experiences. In the waiting room, the women create their own play, filling it with episodes from their lives. The interesting bit is, even though this play of theirs is impromptu, they know exactly how each chapter plays out, because they have all been there – they know what school is like, they know exactly what the bullies say, how it goes at family gatherings, what the aunties are like. They don’t need a script.
They talk about cliched South Asian characters in TV shows, about the history that they are not taught, and about the strength they might have had in their growing up years if they had known the stories of their ancestors.
There is much hilarity too, as they explore the possibilities of Love Island South Asia (with a hat-tip to an Indian matchmaking TV show), or a David Attenborough style documentary about the different kinds of aunties titled Aunt-enborough.
The women in the play are not named. Their names do not matter, one imagines, because the story they are telling is of the universal experience of any minority community. Of being judged, of being forced into boxes of stereotypes, of never being fully accepted.
The actors – Amrita Mangat, Ayesha Sharma, and Misha Domadia, along with Uppal – are a delight to watch. They crackle with energy as they explore the transition from competitors to something deeper than just friends. They’re brown, they are here to make some well needed noise, and the audience is here for it.
Brown Girl Noise runs until 28th September at Riverside Studios with tickets available at https://riversidestudios.co.uk/
Reviewer: Savitha Venugopal
Reviewed: 17th September 2025
North West End UK Rating: