Publications Index | Encyclopedia of Trotskyism | Marxists’s Internet Archive
Socialist Review Index (1993–1996) | Socialist Review 174 Contents
From Socialist Review, No. 174, April 1994.
Copyright © Socialist Review.
Copied with thanks from the Socialist Review Archive.
Marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for ETOL.
Wicked Yaar
by Garry Lyons
Asian youth set out in this play to ‘rebel against our parents’ generation and against racism’. Parents and racists are the two sorts of people who most need rebelling against so I was with them on their starting point.
The play examines the stance of those caught between two cultures: the traditional Islamic values of the East and the disco and soap opera society of the West. And maybe a third, the proud and earthy pig ignorance of Yorkshire Cricket Club.
Its problems arise from trying to cover too much. Racism, music, genies, mixed relationships, cricket and a parallel universe are probably one too many subjects for a single play. Especially as with each of these areas the same dilemma and conclusion is reached: that in rejecting Western racism and Pakistani ‘back to basics’, the young of areas like Bradford are creating an exciting fusion of cultures.
The plot involves the efforts of an Asian boy trying to make his way into the Yorkshire cricket team. Influential characters in Yorkshire cricket include Brian Close, who referred recently to problems with ‘bloody Pakistanis’, and Richard Hutton who once told a West Indian batsman to ‘get back on your jam jar.’ So the lad’s ambition involves more than perfecting his cover drive. Along the way he’s attacked by local bigoted hoodlums and rescued by a genie.
The most exciting illustrations of fusion culture’s virtues come via the all too infrequent Bhangra songs, which with each display elevate the atmosphere to a new level.
The ambition of the cricketer is to be accepted by the English county. The demand to be part of English society is enthusiastically endorsed as more challenging than to live separately and court respect.
Those on the left with attitudes such as, ‘Sudanese peasants may be starving but at least they’re at one with themselves’, and their patronising approval of Eastern culture’s backward elements will no doubt feel uneasy.
It’s a shame that between the excitement of the music and the fights with the racists the acting isn’t strong enough to sustain the long periods of dialogue. But the cricket match with Bhangra backing, a dancing umpire and a woman ‘batsman’ bowled by a genie’s magic powers makes it worth recommending to all members of the MCC, who would then have a collective heart attack and prove that theatre can have a progressive influence.
Wicked Yaar plays in Basildon, Leicester, Bradford and Birmingham in April.
Socialist Review Index | ETOL Main Page
Last updated: 10 March 2017