Hope rises as Rhodes falls

Daniel Nelson

Malindadzimu starts as a sharp-tongued Zimbabwean-British mother-and-daughter clash and ends as a drum-beating, foot-stomping spiritual African rebirth.

Playwright Mufaro Makubika writes with his hand on the accelerator, offering a 100-minutes rush from 15-year-old Hope recovering from stomach-pump rescue in Nottingham to a traditional healer in the Matobo Hills invoking the ancestors to ensure that Rhodes Must Fall.

So Rhodes falls, Hope rises and Faith, her mother – who takes the tough-love initiative of relocating her disturbed daughter to Zimbabwe – gets her now mentally stable daughter back.

There’s also satisfaction for Gogo (“an old woman, a remnant of a past not too long ago”), the link between the Westernised migrants and Africanness, who is in contact with a person capable of treating Hope’s visions (“One who knows our ways and customs”).

The crisp script is brought to life by sharp staging and enough acting energy to power Bulawayo.

Makubika – whose Zimbabwean parents brought him to Britain when he was 16 – says the impetus for writing this, his second play, stemmed from student protests over a statue of Cecil Rhodes in South Africa and from wanting to write a play relevant to a young relative who couldn’t find a work that spoke to her.

The work reflects both motivations, which also explains why it sometimes feels like two distinct plays: the inter-generational migrant relationship and the lingering effects of colonialism. It has good roles, which the five actors seize hungrily, and it spotlights Rhodes’ pernicious legacy.

Job done.

The title, by the way, means “burial place of the deified ancestors” and is the site of Rhodes’ grave – a final finger  from the old diamond magnate, racist and colonialist.

* Malindadzimu by Mufaro Makubika is at the Hampstead Theatre, Eton Avenue, NW3, until 30 October. Info: 7722 9301/ https://www.hampsteadtheatre.com/whats-on/2021/malindadzimu