The Mountaintop

We’ve all heard of Dr Martin Luther King Jr and remember he was assassinated in the 1960s. That’s all you need to know because Katori Hall’s play is his fictional final night.

Her Dr King of that night is tired and tetchy after years of leading long marches across America for the Civil Rights Movement. He calls room service for a cup of coffee and the Memphis motel staffer who brings it ends up staying longer than expected. That’s when our confusions begin. Camae (a brilliant performance by Candy Bowers) is not what she seems and what she is we don’t discover until much later. By that time we are being carried along by the surreal flow of developments.

As Dr King, Pacharo Mzembe (this dynamic young actor is destined for great things in theatre – remember the name!) gives us ‘just a man doing remarkable things’ as he breathes life into the playwright’s powerful dialogue.

Kieran Swann’s set design appears ordinary until we see what it has to do at the end to accommodate Stephen Brodie and Craig Wilkinson (Optical Bloc)’s, splendidly evocative cavalcade of last century’s Civil Rights history. Ben Hughes (lights) and Tony Brumpton (sound) evoke the realities; and director Todd MacDonald has drawn everything together splendidly.

It’s short, sharp, and audience involving. We leave sensing we have just experienced world-class theatre.

Jay McKee

Photographer: Rob McColl