The Empress review

If scale makes good drama, then Tanika Gupta’s 2013 play, spanning 13 years across the ‘golden years’ of the empire, should feel cataclysmic. The Empress begins as a ship from India approaches the London Docks, and follows several Indian immigrants as they take their first steps off the boat and begin to settle in Victorian Britain. The “strange, intoxicated island” they now call home is a vicious one: the climate is chilling and they are subjected to vile racism and hostility daily. But even with a habitat so rich in emotional potential, Gupta’s writing is undercharged and manages to dissociate us from the heart of these people’s stories.

Gupta has taken on a tricky task. The histories of Indian people, who lived in Britain in the late 19th century, are rarely spoken of now, so her writing must attempt to straddle the informative and the dramatic. Sadly, the outcome is more drily explanatory than revelatory or fierce.

Instead of closing in on one narrative, the piece bounces from one pocket of Britain to the next. We peer into the country’s palaces to find Abdul Karim, the ageing Queen Victoria’s Hindi teacher, yet just as their scenes start to slip into more profound territory – with discussions of Britain’s role in worldwide wars and famine – the play abandons momentum and pushes, unnaturally, forwards.

Similarly, among side tales of Indian sailors, the most central narrative is that of Rani Das – a 16-year-old ayah who is cruelly dumped by her white, middle-class employers just as the boat pulls into land. But though she is played with wide-eyed enthusiasm by Tanya Katyal, and we are forced to watch her suffer at the hands of a white man who grew up in India and promises to treat her well as his children’s governess, we never quite get into the realms of experiencing her sorrow.

Under the lyrical direction of Pooja Ghai, the play does find its feet – if only for a passing second. The Indian actors turn their accents up and down in the presence of white people, making their difference stark on stage. In one moment when the magic of India comes alive before our eyes, the stage sings as a maelstrom of colour, life, song and dance. It is just a shame that this luminous sense of vigour is so scarce.

The significance and necessity of plays such as this should not be overlooked. This one, though, needs more focus to fly.

It is an essential historical retelling, but for theatre to work, we need to feel connected.