A new play Love, Bombs and Apples tells the story of four different men all around the world who face a moment of revelation, told in a humorous yet moving manner. The play came to York Theatre Royal stage for two nights and here’s what we thought of it.
By Josh Orme
The play Love, Bombs, and Apples has been approximately six years in the making from 2009, when the first character was brought to the page and stage at RADA (The Royal Academy of Dramatic Art), to 2015 when it was pitched to Arcola’s PlayWROUGHT festival and selected by them as one of the twelve new readings that were performed in January 2015. This was a big step for Hassan Abdulrazzak, and Asif Khan’s venture. Now in the present year Asif came to grace the York Theatre Royal with a performance of the piece that is currently touring for the next few months. Along with director Rosamunde Hutt, set and costumes by Mila Sanders, lighting by Charlie Lucas, and sound effects from James Hesford, this production team came together to produce a thought provoking and enjoyable piece of stage.
From the newly refurbished studio in the York Theatre Royal, this intimate production of Love, Bombs, and Apples, was a truly entertaining, humorous, and believable performance. Set in the modern era and in four different locations, Palestine, Pakistan, Bradford, and New York, wherein RADA graduate and Laurence Olivier Bursary Award winner Asif Khan single-handedly portrayed all four characters. Through relevant and some highly topical tales concerning sex, politics, literature/terrorism, family, and abnormally humorous names, to highlight but a few. With characters ranging from an actor, to a writer, to an Apple cynic, and a political activist/boxer, there is a lot going on within this production, though the quick costume changes and convincing portrayals sectioned the characters from one another rather well. The second segment of the play was personally one of the best, due to the serious content it covered (terrorism) but to do so in such a light-hearted fashion was brilliant.
Love, Bombs and Apples played at York Theatre Royal on the 29 and 30 June and is touring around the UK until the end of July.