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Shepherd’s Bush’s beloved, hugely influential theatre institution the Bush turns 50 this year, and artistic director Lynette Linton has just announced an enormous half-centenary season that will stretch well into 2023.
There’s lots of good stuff there, from all manner of playwrights, kicking off with Beru Tessema’s ‘House of Ife’, which starts previews next month. However, there’s unquestionably one name that stands out in the context of the traditionally fairly low-key Bush: Sir Lenny Henry will be making his debut as a playwright with his monologue ‘August in England’, about a Jamaican immigrant to the West Midlands who is proud of the life he has made in England in the decades since coming over… until he gets horrifyingly caught up in the Windrush scandal. This is Henry’s first play, though he’s no stranger to stage acting, and he’ll be performing ‘August in England’ himself when it runs in a production by Lynette Linton and Daniel Bailey next April.
The tickets for ‘August in England’ aren’t due to go on sale until June, but in the meantime the first tranche of fiftieth anniversary shows – that’s ‘House of Ife’, plus ‘Favour’ by Ambreen Razia and ‘The P Word’ by Waleed Akhtar – are on sale already.
‘August in England’ is at the Bush Theatre, Apr 28-Jun 10 2023.