Kwame Kwei-Armah’s embarrassing update of Love Thy Neighbour: Beneatha’s Place, at the Young Vic, reviewed

Beneatha’s Place, set in the 1950s, follows a black couple who encounter racial prejudice when they move to a predominately white suburb. The location is Nigeria but it might as well be the USA because most of the characters, both black and white, are American. (The Young Vic has strong links with America, and a transfer to Broadway may be under discussion.) The script by Kwame Kwei-Armah is inspired by the British sitcom Love Thy Neighbour, which aired five decades ago. This misunderstood show was pretty progressive for the 1970s, and it examined the conflict between two thick white bigots living next door to an intelligent and sophisticated couple from the Caribbean.

The format of this play is more or less identical but the dialogue is malignant rather than frivolous. The white Americans are idiotically patronising and they assume that no person of colour can use a light switch or run a bath. The black couple don’t bother to hide their anti-white prejudice and they treat the Caucasians with open rudeness and contempt. It’s uncomfortable to watch but there’s plenty to enjoy if you’re a racist. The script includes a puzzling element. The black couple are excited by Africa’s forthcoming liberation and they play recordings of political anthems to accompany their love-making. The idea that patriotic music is an aphrodisiac belongs to the lexicon of fascist propaganda.

Act Two copies a device from the hilarious race-hate comedy Clybourne Park, which Kwei-Armah seems to have studied as closely as Love Thy Neighbour. Seven decades have passed and the couple’s sitting-room has become an office where American professors meet to discuss the future of critical race theory. It’s an interesting debate. Rather dry, though. One lecturer suggests that the battle against racism has merely entrenched it permanently.