Miles – Southwark Playhouse

The Southwark Playhouse (Borough) was heaving and giddy for the Monday press night of Miles, which swaggers into London after dazzling Edinburgh Fringe last year. Two young women were sat next to me. We chatted before the show started. They are both actors, blessed with good looks, quick wit and youthful enthusiasm. They were amused to hear I’m reviewing the show. Why? One of them turned out to be to be Amelia Bright, Assistant Director on this production.

Written and directed by Oliver Kaderbhai, the concept of this show was crafted by globally renowned jazz trumpet whizz, Jay Phelps. He also happens play one of two characters in Miles. Phelps plays a thinly veiled version of himself. His co-star, Benjamin Akintuyosi, plays Miles Davis. Phelps isn’t messing about. The man with the trumpet is also a club DJ, Jazz FM host, recording artist and a musician who’s shared a stage with Amy Winehouse and Shabaka Hutchings. Even with those chops and that CV, Jay Phelps is always going to be in the shadow of the ‘greats’. And Miles Davis is the GOAT.

Kind of Blue is not just a benchmark in jazz, it’s a historical moment in music. That album caused a ripple on the lake of consciousness. It was so impactful and mysteriously unique that Davis became synonymous with witchcraft, voodoo and satanism. Like, he HAD to have sold his soul to make something that good. Davis was known as the Prince of Darkness long before Peter Mandleson. His talent was viewed as supernatural by his peers and came with a lively side order of some pretty demonic behaviour.

A Kind of Blue is the focus of this show and is probably the only jazz album that people have a subconscious familiarity with. They couldn’t identify a tuba or a spell ‘saxophone’, but Kind of Blue is in their head somewhere.  Film soundtracks. Background music at ‘80s dinner parties. The CD that was played on a loop in suburban wine bars and aspirational restaurants. The album’s tracks have featured in a raft of TV shows (The Wire, Dexter, Mad Men, The Simpsons, Homeland, The West Wing and The Marvellous Mrs. Maisel). People don’t know they know it, but it’s buried deep in their neural pathways. This show goes some way to answering the question as to why that might be.

The character played by Jay Phelps is a contemporary jazz musician who digs out the master tapes of the Kind of Blue recordings. This action elicits the ghost of Miles Davis who then torments and teaches the aspiring youngblood with technical advice, devastating shade and hilariously rum anecdotes. Benjamin Akintuyosi is spellbinding as Miles Davis. It’s a career defining, jaw dropping and highly compelling turn. Not only does he nail the subtle physicality, with chilling eye rolls and the twitches of addiction, but he perfects the post-operative gravelly voice of later years and the hip cat street jive yap of his youth.

Miles is a 90-minute imagined dialogue between the master and a student, where the model is the archetype of that ancient dynamic. Basically, the teacher is super mean to the point of cruelty and if the student survives the onslaught, they might get on the road to enlightenment. Such methods are out of fashion in 2026 and are horrendous to experience but DO make great entertainment. Watching Miles Davis bitch and berate Jay Phelps is also an education, in history, popular culture, civil rights and the philosophy of jazz. Miles Davis said, “Don’t play what’s there, play what’s not there.”

It’s a testament to Akintuyosi’s dexterity that when his Davis explains such profound concepts to the musician he’s haunting, it makes total sense. A great actor, with a rigorous understanding of the text can make Shakespeare sound natural and easy. Akintuyosi embodies the Davis spirit with such clarity that the deep musical significance of absence and silence were fleetingly within my intellectual grasp. I felt smarter after watching Miles, even if this was far from the truth.

Does this show skip over some of the grim aspects of the Davis narrative? Absolutely. If you want the pimping, smack-slamming, cursing, unrepentant misogynist narrative, go read Miles Davis- The Autobiography, written with poet and journalist Quincy Troupe. This ain’t that. And that’s a LOT.

This show is a fact-packed theatrical dip into the history of an iconic recording. There isn’t enough time to cover all the crazy aspects of the jazz legend’s story. Not only did Davis abuse sex workers to fund his heroin habit, but he also played a fictional pimp in an episode of ‘80s TV show Miami Vice. One could do a 3-hour musical on that fact alone.

In Miles, the audience is blessed with a living trumpet luminary who uses live music and a prickly Miles Davis to give us a gripping dialogue, but also a lesson in jazz and the nuances of creativity. Go for Akintuyosi’s performance and Phelps will grab you with his trumpet playing.  

Miles is at Southwark Playhouse (Borough) until 7th March 2026, https://southwarkplayhouse.co.uk/

Reviewer: Stuart Who?

Reviewed: 9th February 2026

North West End UK Rating: