Sixty-three years ago, on the evening of November 1, 1961, the Negro Theatre Workshop (NTW)—one of Britain’s first Black theater companies—launched its first performance at the Lyric Theatre Hammersmith in London. Founded by Pearl Connor-Mogotsi, the NTW debuted the first British performance of William Branch’s A Wreath for Udomo, a play based on Peter Abrahams’ novel of the same name. The play follows Michael Udomo, an African man from the fictional colony of Panafrica, who lives in London and returns to Panafrica to lead a successful revolution against the British colonial government. Abrahams based his novel on his experiences in London during the 1940s collaborating with future revolutionaries Kwame Nkrumah, George Padmore, and Jomo Kenyatta, among others. Prophesizing African revolutions and postcolonial nation-building, Abrahams published the novel one year before Ghana, then the Gold Coast, became independent in 1957. Only a few years later, in 1961, the play offered a space to consider the implications of colonialism, race, and nation-building in the context of growing demands for the decolonization of African and Asian nations. Audience members included government officials, producers, and community members all eager to engage with a narrative centered on race, colonialism, and African nation-building.
On stage, Edric Connor played the lead character, Michael Udomo, an African anticolonial leader from Panafrica. In one of the early scenes, Udomo is at a party with other African revolutionaries as well as their white British friends, including a white government official, Lord Rosslee. A phonograph is playing jazz, and the characters are dancing together. The atmosphere is jovial. The party celebrates one of the men becoming a surgeon.
However, the mood shifts as Udomo learns that Lord Rosslee is likely to be appointed to a colonial position in Panafrica, Udomo’s home country. Udomo is optimistic. He assumes that having Lord Rosslee as a friend and ally in Panafrica’s colonial government will help his anticolonial forces put an end to colonialism in the country. Udomo says, “Then this is it! The break we've been waiting for.” Lord Rosslee’s potential role, according to Udomo, will help secure independence without much explicit support from Lord Rosslee.
Yet, Lord Rosslee quickly dismisses the idea that his appointment could aid the anticolonial movement. He will not consider any personal action to support the anticolonial movement. Udomo curses, “Well, dammit: Are you for us or against us? You know, sometimes I think you hot-house liberals," but another party guest cuts Udomo off, trying to deescalate the disagreement. Lord Rosslee insinuates that colonialism is not all bad. He believes that British colonialism has its benefits — namely facilitating Panafrican development. Udomo is livid.
As tensions escalate, David Mhendi, an African character from the fictional country of the Confederation, returns to the stage. He frantically exclaims “[T]hey’ve shot my wife.” The British colonial government in the Confederation murdered a dozen Black African people, including his wife, because they refused to give up the land that they had lived on for years. When Lord Rosslee’s wife asks why, Udomo repeats back her question and bellows, “Because her skin is black, that’s why!” To Udomo, the crisis of colonialism has never been clearer. He resolves to return to Panafrica to lead the revolution against the British colonial government.
Before the audience could see the rise of Udomo as an anticolonial leader and later Prime Minister of Panafrica, Connor, the actor playing Udomo, collapsed, suffering a heart attack on stage – abruptly halting the NTW’s first performance. Connor’s onstage health challenges foreshadowed financial and institutional troubles for the organization. Still, seven days after Connor’s collapse, the NTW reconvened with a new lead actor, Leo Carera. Despite the show’s rocky beginnings, critics in The Times and Daily Telegraph praised the actors’ performances as well as the content of the play. The West Indian Gazette called the first performance “An unprecedently well-attended and representative Special Performance of English, West Indian, African and Asian friends.”
While the Negro Theatre Workshop’s first performance was interrupted by Connor’s heart attack, the organization itself filled a crucial gap in the field of British theatre. During much of the 20th century, there were few roles for Black actors, with producers often opting for African Americans instead of Black British talent. Previous attempts to establish Black theatre groups to combat American dominance and the limited, often stereotypical roles for Black performers struggled to gain sustained support. In 1944, actor Robert Adams created the Negro Repertory Theater which produced only one show: Eugene O'Neill's All Gods Chillun' Got Wings with the Colchester Repertory Company. In the late 1940s, Pauline Henriques and other Black British performers, who had been cast as understudies to African American leads, formed the Negro Theatre Company to provide dynamic and frequent roles for Black Commonwealth actors countering industry's relegation of them to understudy roles. However, the Company struggled to survive because of a lack of unity among performers and limited affordable performance space. After the Negro Theatre Workshop’s inaugural performance, it produced roughly ten plays from 1961 to 1967, including The Road by Nigerian Nobel Prize-winning author, Wole Soyinka. The Workshop also represented Britain at the 1966 First World Arts Festival of Negro Arts in Dakar, Senegal, a month-long celebration of Black culture. The Workshop and, particularly its founder Pearl Connor-Mogotsi, were essential to the development of Black British theatre, helping to build the infrastructure for Black British performers and showcasing their talent in an industry that consistently overlooked them.
By performing a successful revolution before the independence of much of sub-Saharan Africa, A Wreath for Udomo prophesized an independent continent. It raised questions about complicity and solidarity in colonial resistance as well as explored the tensions between western-educated leaders and the people they represent. The play allowed contemporary audience members to witness how anticolonial movements might succeed as well as challenges in African nation-building in concrete terms, informing movements in real-time. Only four years earlier, in 1957, Ghana became the first sub-Saharan nation to gain independence from the United Kingdom. In the same year of the NTW’s first performance, Sierra Leone also became independent, followed by Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, and Uganda in the next year. More nations would follow in the subsequent decade.
As the play enters its sixty-third year, we are reminded of the performance’s exploration of complicity, solidarity, and the struggle for liberation against colonial rule and violence. To revisit A Wreath for Udomo is to reconsider the legacies of political art as consistent and important sites of resistance to imperialism with real-time significance.
Alex Keith is a PhD candidate in the Department of History at Northwestern University. Her research focuses on Black cultural and political activism in the United Kingdom and United States. Alex is particularly interested in how Black women artists have envisioned and communicated racial freedoms through their art practices. Her dissertation is a comparative study of two of the first Black women founded theater groups in London and Chicago during the 1960s and 1970s.
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