Rebellious Fela Resounds with Exotic Joy

Were it not for Fela, we would perhaps not come to know very much about the Nigerian culture in the 70s and 80s - the excruciating pain and suffering that Kuti's people endured at the hands of the Nigerian government, overrun by corporate greed ... and their  customs, starkly primitive, yet stimulating nonetheless. The actors' words and images with actual newsreel footage on background screens serve to enlighten, but it is Kuti's vibrant music, which was influenced by jazz, Sinatra, James Brown and other internationally popular styles, that grabs our attention throughout. Act I offers the variety Kuti brought to his music, how the horns add so much more to the steady rhythms of the percussion instruments. Act II, with the torture of the women and Funmilayo's death, presents selections of a more spiritual nature, none more gripping than Marshall's stunning interpretation of "Rain" in which she, as Funmilayo, advises Fela from the great beyond.

 

This piece works so well because of its resplendent ensemble, every member adding character and individuality to the unified whole. Apart from Ngaujah and Marshall, Paulette Ivory as Sandra brings an unstable yet stunning power to the American black woman who educated Kuti about what it meant to be black in a white supremist society. Kuti's other women, called 'whores' by the powers that were, are not only strikingly beautiful, but move, every step, with an attitude that is noticeably alluring and formidable.