In Search of a White Identity – The Actors Centre
This short play, filmed at The Actors Centre in Seven Dials, is written by Cliffordkuju Henry, who also stars as Patrick.
As we find this black man in a holding area in a police station together with the white Mickey (played by Drew Edwards), we know we are in complex territory. Both have been arrested for their behaviour on a march that has turned violent, and although they were childhood friends, Mickey has become a right-wing white supremacist.
Both come from the same background: violent father, a mother they couldn’t protect, a deprived inner-city estate. This is explored to some extent but fails to fully address the whys and wherefores of how such an upbringing may breed extreme views in later life.
Years on, their former playground has been ‘gentrified', and Mickey in partic...