Review: BRIXTON CALLING, Southwark Playhouse Borough

When a business venture begins with “a single British pound pushed across the desk” and leads to iconic musicians like Bruce Springsteen performing at the venue, one knows they’re in for a good story.

Brixton Calling is a play, written by Alex Urwin and directed by Bronagh Lagan, that tells the story of how Simon Parkes (Max Runham) fell in love with the decrepit Astoria Variety Cinema and made it his goal to transform it into a music venue where everyone could feel free to let loose and be themselves - not a seat in sight. The show is inspired by the best-selling memoir, Live at the Academy: A Riotous Life in the Music Business, that Parkes wrote about his experience bringing the venue to life in 2014.

The audience learns about Parkes’s childhood, growing up as the heir to a fishing company in Scotland. His mother worries about him being bullied as he only has one arm, but Parkes learns self-defense with a man who gives him lessons he keeps in his head for the rest of life, encouraging him to keep going with “no excuses.”

After making a deal with a man outside of the Rainbow Theatre in London for tickets, Parkes gets himself and his friend into a Chuck Berry concert and falls in love with the music, with Tendai Humphrey belting out “Johnny B. Goode.” With his dreams of being a rockstar still in his mind, Parkes breaks into (though is it breaking in if the padlock isn’t locked) an abandoned venue in Brixton, and immediately knows that this place has the potential to become incredible. 

At only 23 years old, Parkes makes a deal to lease the venue for only £1, taking it off the hands of two businessmen who didn’t have the money to pay for the repairs the building so desperately needed. He meets Jonny Lawes (Sitima), a man with a dog named Gregory Isaacs, who quickly becomes his partner in the business venture, helping him get acts to the newly-christened Academy.  Along with playing the main roles of Simon Parkes and Johnny Lawes, Runham and Sitima take on all of the other roles within the show, from posh Engishmen to fabulous drag queens - there’s even a Thatcher impression from Dunham.

Runham and Sitima also provide the majority of the musical accompaniment with live performances, with only some of the music being prerecorded, especially the rave music of the 1990s. For the majority of the show, the sound design by Max Pappenheim does a fantastic job of balancing both the live and recorded music with the voices of the two performers. There is only one section in which it is difficult to hear Runham and Sitima, appropriately during the rave sequences taking a look at the music culture of the 1990s. 

Using Southwark Playhouse’s The Little is the perfect place for Brixton Calling. The set, designed by Nik Corrall, makes audiences feel like they are entering a concert venue, with posters littering the stage, bright lights (designed by Derek Anderson) hitting the audience and haze filling the space. There are times when Runham and Sitima are running up and down the aisles, making the small space feel even more intimate - I even received one of the “flyers” for a concert, one of many Runham hands out while describing the advertising process for the Academy. 

While most of the story focuses on the personal life of Parkes and his own journey to making the Academy the name it is today, there is also cultural commentary on Brixton and the attitudes of North London versus South London. In between scenes, radio clips about social and political unrest play, giving the audience some context to the world outside of the Academy.

One scene takes place during the 1981 Brixton Riot, where Parkes experiences clashes between the public and the police for the first time, exposing him to a world he had been unaware of before. There is even some mention of the gentrification of Brixton, with Parkes commenting on the irony of how the positions of places like Brixton and Clapham have swapped over the decades. 

A highlight of the show comes in its more emotional moments, those when Runham is given the chance to show the audience what is going on inside Parkes’s mind. Urwin writes scenes that beautifully describe what it is like to have an eye-opening moment, like the one in which Parkes first enters what will become the Academy. One feels as though they are inside the venue with Parkes, running their hands along the walls and hearing the echoes of music past, present and future.

But that isn’t to say that this is an entirely serious show - there are some great comedy moments, including an unbelievable - but true - story about when Nirvana was supposed to perform at the Academy and a jab at Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.

Brixton Calling is a passionate and powerful perspective of the history of an iconic music venue, with Runham and Sitima both giving fantastic acting and musical performances to bring the story of Simon Parkes to life. Whether you’re a theatre fan or a music lover, you’re sure to find something to love in the show. 

Brixton Calling runs unti 16 August at Southwark Playhouse, Borough.