Theatre critics are raving about the latest offering of the ‘Shebada’ franchise, ‘Bangarang’, written by the multi-award winning, David Tulloch. After a tremendously successful run of Bashment Granny 3 including over hundreds of local performances and over sixty overseas shows, the team is ready to turn up the heat this Christmas.
Apart from being a fiery comedy, the producers decided to spice up their usual tasty recipe with some new ingredients. The ‘Shebada’ franchise normally caters to the dancehall masses and now Bangarang, while still catering to the dancehall masses has come to a middle ground with elements of main-stream theatre.
Firstly, the script has been created by Tulloch, who has been successfully chalking up commercial hits for the mainstream markets for years. The cast features two-time Actor Boy award winning veteran actress Terri Salmon, four time best actor winner and movie titan Chris Mcfarlane and Tulloch himself who has appeared in quite a bit of mainstream productions of note.
Ably directed B. Lloyd Allen, the consummate mainstream professionals join the road warriors such asTrudy Bell famous for her turn in of the hilariously Paul Beale created character ‘Melcita’, Patrick Smith and the prince of comedy himself, Keith ‘Shebada’ Ramsay. The iconic blend of talents have ensured that the comedy is properly seasoned and the drama simmers well enough to keep the storyline in check.
‘Bangarang’ will open at the Green Gables Theatre on 6 Cargill Avenue in Kingston. It will also run from Wednesday to Sunday at 8 p.m. The comedy reveals true to life scenarios on Princess Street in the downtown Kingston environs.
The audience will meet the character Pearl, a hustling higgler by day, trying to make ends meet but she is a dismal failure at selling her goods and is forced to become a prostitute by night, giving rise to her claim to fame. Pearl is caught amidst the love interests of suitors, some of them clients, who use her for various means. It is through these various relationships that we meet the politician ‘Winston Justice’ whose ambition is to become the member of parliament for the constituency covering Princess Street, since the area is no longer under the control of a ‘Don’.
Other interesting characters include ‘Officer Shellaz’ a policeman of simple means who is trying to better himself by any means necessary and ‘Preacher’ a mysterious intellect of a gangster-like nature.
Here is the twist: Officer Shellaz is madly in love with Pearl but she only sees him as a client. Pearl’s heart is tied up with the politician Winston Justice but he is married to her sister. So left alone, she only has the comforting words of Preacher to lean on.
Thrown into this mix is Haberdashery owner ‘Miss Chin’ who is desperately trying to own all the land downtown to build a supercentre. In addition, the comedic pot of soup is complete with the all-time hustler and ‘know-all’, the handcart man, Shebada.
