Talawa Theatre Company at the Victoria and Albert Museum presents The Colored Museum

The Colored Museum

15 - 23 October

"Welcome aboard Celebrity Slaveship. I'm Miss Pat and I'll be serving you today in Cabin A.

We'll be crossing the Atlantic at high altitude so you must wear your shackles at all times.

During the flight I'll be by with magazines, and your earphones can be purchased for the price of your first-born male."

So begins The Colored Museum, George C. Wolfe's seriously funny, sophisticated satire that has discomforted and delighted audiences since it was written in 1986.

Taking place in an imagined cultural museum, 11 living exhibits explore 200 years of the African-American experience in an exhibition of stereotypes.

Through characters like the ever-smiling Miss Pat, Wolfe confronts history and clichés with gutsy humour.

Director: Don Warrington
Set/Costume designer: Jonathan Fensom
Lighting designer: Jason Taylor
Musical director: Dominique Le Gendre
Sound designer: Joseph Young

Suitable for 16+

Black Myth Versus History

15 October
Dr. Robert Beckford

Documentary film maker, educator and academic theologian, Dr. Robert Beckford, leads a discussion examining two and a half decades of Black British identity.

The Colored Museum poses the question that the panel discuss, 'How do you decide which aspect of your experience and identity to retain and which to discard?'

Panel mambers

Topher Campbell (Theatre director, writer and filmmaker. Co-founder of rukus!Federation and Artistic Director of The Red Room)
Bonnie Greer (Playwright and critic)
Dr. Nicola Rollock (Research Associate for the Runnymede Trust and author of The Stephen Lawrence Inquiry 10 Years On)

The Coloured Museum Video