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Kieron Quirke's rating
Reader rating
Dir: Nicolas Kent, Indhu Rubasingham, Charlotte Westenra.
Cast: Ob Abili, Lorraine Burroungs, Karl Collins, Jenny Jules, Charlotte Lucas, Alibe Parsons, Clare Perkins, Chris Tummings, Howard Ward
Description: A programme of short dramas that explore the current situation in Darfur, with contributions from The Tricycle Bloomberg Writers Group.
Trains: Tube: Kilburn/BR: Brondesbury 
Phone: 0207328 1000
Website: www.tricycle.co.uk
How long Is Never? Karl Collins, Jenny Jules, Chris Tummings and Obi Abili in one of the plays about Darfur
Sometimes traditional theatrical virtues take a back seat. This is so in the case of this functional but hardly inspiring set of plays at the Tricycle, which preach far more than they entertain, and present the complex situation in Darfur too simply by half.
Yet sending a theatre critic to judge these things is like sending a motor critic to judge a tank. This night has a purpose, to raise awareness of the Darfur genocide, and it fulfils it, sending away your critic, who suffers not so much from new, trendy compassion fatigue as a perennial compassion ME, better informed and, for that reason, moved.
But if these plays are direct, they are also dull. Words Words Words - an unfunny sketch attacking UN inaction - is the worst. Most of the rest are what you might call testimonial shorts, in which any drama feels incidental to the climactic moment when a victim stands forward and bears witness to the atrocity she has suffered. They draw fine performances from the female cast, particularly Jenny Jules in Amy Evans' Many Men's Wife.
Yet it is depressing how easily the plays fit this pattern. Victims are the sole subjects of events. There are no collaborators, nor do the "bad guys" - the Sudanese government or the paramilitary Janjaweed - get stage space. Similarly perturbing is that, though genocide is the supposed focus of the evening, all the accounts are of the more personal, sensational atrocity of rape. It's pity porn, as calculatingly effective as it is mindlessly manipulative.
The best piece avoids the formula. Lynn Nottage's Give, Again? is a gentle joke about our attitudes to charity, which finishes the evening perfectly, leaving you amused but guilty. The discussion afterwards, lead by political and media experts, fills in the details the plays skirt over.
Until Saturday. Information: 020 7328 1000; www.tricycle.co.uk
Details are correct at the time of publication - please check with venue before booking.
