On stage, a Sikh tabla player drums out a steady rhythm. A prisoner is strapped to a cannon, awaiting their final breaths. A British general probes them for their story and we, for watching, are all complicit. Kanpur: 1857 is a poetic tale set in the Indian Rebellion of 1857 and questions whose story it is to tell and on whose terms it is laid out.
Starring Niall Moorjani, Jonathan Oldfield and with backing from Scottish-Indian tabla player Sodhi, the show is a dynamic satire of the ever-looming, ever-changing face of colonial rule, which continues to rear its ugly head in the present. Moorjani draws us in effortlessly with enchanting storytelling, their poetic cadence contrasting with the horrors they detail. The dynamic between the pair on stage is delightfully sharp as Oldfield’s performance flits between comic and stoic with impressive ease.
Kanpur: 1857 is a testament to Moorjani’s ability to create a multi-faceted re-telling that doesn’t just unravel the many constructions of the Empire, but that speaks the truth for those who never had the chance to, whose lives and intersectional selves were blotted out of history. Fatal binaries are laid out before us; innocent or guilty, man or woman, both or neither, dead or alive. The best type of show is one that leaves its audience thinking about their own world, their own society and the consequences to their actions within it. Kanpur: 1857, with only one hour, does just that.
Kanpur: 1857, Pleasance Courtyard, until 24 Aug (not 12, 13), 3.40pm