Portraying the slave trade accurately is incredibly sensitive. Did you encounter any challenges while you were putting the production together?
On a practical level we felt we wanted to take this play into those cities which traditionally in the UK are associated with the history of slavery like Liverpool and Bristol and London. We managed London but failed to get into Liverpool and finally managed to get into a theatre in Bristol.
There may be lots of reasons for that. It may be that in certain places major theatres were going to do something of their own on a similar subject but there may also be a sense in which the wounds are still quite tender under the surface and people have a hesitancy about stirring things up.So it has been a challenge to get this play to be taken by as many theatres as we would like but we have still managed to get a good tour together and we are really pleased about that.
In terms of the company from the outset, I wanted the story to be told from essentially a black perspective. I wanted there to be only one white actor in the cast - John Newton - and everybody else to be played by a black ensemble around Equiano, just to make sure that the filter by which a British audience is looking at this story was very firmly an African one.
Whether we've seen Amazing Grace the film or whatever we are aware that there can be a little bit of false self-congratulation in a sense in the white community for saying, 'Oh, well, we've got these great inspirational white leaders like Wilberforce who changed the world,' but of course the part played by the black leaders is terribly significant and Equiano's story was just waiting to be really represented to people and his is the one that really grabs you, although Newton's is complicated as the white history is indeed complicated - it takes a long time for people to come out and say 'I was wrong' and confess publicly. But Equiano's story has never really been told properly before until comparatively recently and it is a really exciting story and I wanted that to be the motor behind the entire thing.
But in terms of problems, there have been no problems at all! I have had a wonderful time working with both this particular cast and also Ben Okafor, a Nigerian singer who has written some fantastic music, which has given the production a very rich and African flavour.
CT: So that was quite important to you as Artistic Director?
PB: Yes absolutely, to make sure it felt like Africans telling an African's story. It's interesting because it really does make an impact on the audience. They think, 'oh Wilberforce is being portrayed to us through a black man?'
People have said, after seeing the big film [Amazing Grace], where are the black actors in the film? Where is the black story? Of course, it isn't in the film. But it is very much in African Snow so if people want that balance redressed they should come and see this.
