As Sutara Gayle’s intensely autobiographical show starts, the theatre sits in darkness, while a soulful, passionate, overture begins. Already, it feels like we’re bearing witness to something spiritual. And then we see her; Gayle, otherwise known as Lorna Gee stands angelic and sturdy, ready to tell her life story.
And what a remarkable story it is. The Legends of Them takes us back to reggae pioneer Gayle’s childhood in Brixton, through her sexual awakening, early music career and on a transformative trip to India. We see her moving from one school to the next, into the care system and finding her soul through singing. Is all of it coherent? Absolutely not. Gayle flits from the body of one person in her life to the next, sometimes without any change in her physicality at all. In just a few seconds, she is her mother, a child psychiatrist, and her sister. There is no sense of a linear structure, with the narrative jumping around haphazardly.
You’re sure to leave the theatre slightly bewildered. But, once you accept it is a bit of a minefield, Gayle’s otherworldly presence is hard to look away from. Blending music with history, video with raw emotion onstage, she is a force to be reckoned with. In scraps she reveals herself through her memories; scenes from her past flash into reality and then disappear once more. Gayle has had a life so rich that even one of her recollections could form a full play themselves; especially the police shooting of her big sister Cherry Groce, which started the Brixton Riots in 1985.
You get the sense that The Legends of Them is merely a slice of Gayle’s wildly varied existence. But, the show, which started its life at Brixton House last year still feels magisterial on the Royal Court stage. Directed and co-created by Jo NcInnes, Gayle is its nucleus. When she stands on the top of sky-high speakers, as they pulse with light and blare out sound that could have been birthed from her, it is a mighty sight indeed.
In the last scene we see footage of Gayle burning her dreadlocks on an open fire. “I feel so free, so liberated, so light,” she says, almost as if she’s shredding her past skin. ‘The Legends of Them’ is a congregation of Gayle’s life experiences; her bow is her finally letting them go.