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The Guardian
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
This Bitter Earth review – fighting and flirting in a wild ride steered by Billy Porter
There are never just two people in a room, or two voices in a conversation. For the interracial gay couple in Harrison David Rivers's 2017 play, those voices are freighted with complexity: white privilege and Black hurt, queer joy and rage, all shimmering around the simplest dialogue. Jesse (Omari Douglas) is a Black playwright who prioritises his work; Neil (Alexander Lincoln) is a white activist who comes from wealth and will cross the country to support a protest. Set between 2012 and 2015 – from Obama in excelsis to rising Trump – the play skitters across this timeline, not always clearly ('Emotional truth is of greater value than logic,' reads an author's note). Scenes are short and sharp – some only a splinter – and typically end in a snog or a strop. In Billy Porter's finely cast production, Douglas's Jesse, spindly and spiky, has a crackling chemistry with Lincoln's righteous, goofy Neil. The pair relate their first encounter – when Neil demonstrated his allyship at a protest, clinging to a statue and reciting poetry ('This bitch with the bullhorn,' as Jesse calls him). Cue fierce conversations in cabs, bars and subways. Neil can't understand his lover's wariness around public dissent; Jesse despairs at the other's unquestioned ease. Jesse, his hinterland withheld, finds it easier to address the audience than unpack his mind to Neil. Rivers drives a wild ride – he'll grab the wheel and swerve between acrimony and snuggle, from banter to bitter division. As the couple navigate their differences, conversations get deep quickly – perhaps they were always skating on thin ice. Rivers's writing can editorialise, and while Porter's production brings energy and an excellent playlist, it pushes hard on the pedals – the actors commit to flirt and fight, but by the end of the 90 minutes, both voices sound raw. Lee Curran's lighting frames the stage in neon, flaring yellow in alarm whenever something terrible happens in the wider country – as it does, again and again. And, as slowly emerges, something terrible also happens close at hand. At Soho theatre, London, until 26 July
Times
25-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Times
This Bitter Earth review — I was moved to tears by Billy Porter's show
This two-hander by the American playwright Harrison David Rivers charts a volatile but loving interracial gay relationship with quick wit and deep compassion. The writing is sharp, nuanced and, as the leads in this production at Soho Theatre's Dean Street headquarters amply demonstrate, highly playable. Although set roughly a decade ago in New York City and Minnesota (where Rivers is based), its many-stranded themes of race, class, sexual identity, art and activism are relevant and emotionally rousing. It may seem like a modest show but it has real resonance. • Read more theatre reviews, guides and interviews Jesse, played by Omari Douglas (whose credits include the hit TV series It's a Sin), is a whip-smart, somewhat introverted black playwright from a humble and religious background in the Midwest. As Neil, Alexander Lincoln (who played Jamie Tate in Emmerdale from 2019 to 2021) is by contrast outgoing, from a moneyed New York family on the east coast, and white. Much to his credit, Rivers' cinematically splintered script slips between locations and time without ever confusing us or losing our interest and investment in characters who are by turns flirtatious and lusty, argumentative and tender, silly and serious — in other words, complex, multidimensional people. It helps, of course, that the two skilful actors share a winning and palpable chemistry. Their director, Billy Porter, is a Tony, Emmy and Grammy-winning actor and singer who just finished a stint as the Emcee in the West End revival of Cabaret. (You may also have seen him in the American television series Pose.) His work here, on the designer Morgan Large's simple, stylish set, is slick yet sensitive. Porter and his cast get the rhythms of the writing just right. Rivers' examination of culture, politics and privilege is funny, intellectually engaging and shot through with feeling. The audience's presence is deftly acknowledged more than once via direct address, with houselights up and the actors in our midst. The device works. There is tragedy here in the form of a key incident of homophobic violence that is repeated, with variations, several times. It was plain on the press night that some spectators were crying or choking back tears. This life-embracing show may well move you to tears, but it also has the power to shift and heighten your thinking.★★★★☆90minSoho Theatre, London, to Jul 26, Follow @timesculture to read the latest reviews
Yahoo
19-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
This Bitter Earth: Billy Porter reveals all about his West End directorial debut (EXCLUSIVE)
On a close June afternoon in southeast London, Attitude steps into a sparse, fluorescent-lit rehearsal space: four chairs placed in its centre, a refreshments table in dire need of replenishment in from the side, and the constant thrumming of an aged air conditioning unit dominating the room. This is an 'in-between' space, a space charged with the relentless emotional heavy-lifting of four people busy at work, building something raw and is here that Billy Porter's West End directorial debut is being constructed. This Bitter Earth, written by Harrison David Rivers, is a searing exploration of love, race and identity through the story of an interracial gay couple, Jesse (Omari Douglas), a Black playwright, and Neil (Alexander Lincoln), a white activist. 'It's nice to know… even when I haven't been in the director's chair for a long time, I still got it,' smiles Porter. The play may mark his debut on the London stage, but Porter is no novice when it comes to directing. 'The problem solving is my favourite part. The creation of something, from the page to the stage.' Porter contrasts the director's chair with having recently finished a stint as The Emcee, in Cabaret. 'I had an amazing time… it's also eight shows a week. It's more than an ocean, we are athletes. There's nothing outside of doing that, when that is happening, so you gotta really want to be doing it, and I really love Cabaret.' A world away from the glamour of the Kit Kat Club, our conversation halts briefly as we put the air conditioning unit out of its misery. 'The Brits are so quiet', Porter jokes, referencing this writer's own voice projection. When Billy Porter offers feedback, you act on throats cleared, conversation turns to the sanctity and emotional balm that the theatre has long provided for the LGBTQ+ community. Writer Harrison David Rivers reflects on the gift that theatre has offered him over the years. 'The theatre has always been a kind of church for me. It's always been a sacred space,' he says. 'When I write a play, it's a blueprint for whomever decides to engage with it… I want them to feel all the things that the characters feel, to leave having experienced something. Leave lighter, and/or encouraged, and/or empowered, raring to go, to change something, to tear something down.' Rivers has a definite idea of his ideal target audience – or mindset – of who he wants to be impacted by This Bitter Earth: everyone. Full stop. 'I want all. I want everybody. I think this story is for everyone.' Actor Alexander Lincoln – known for roles in rugby drama In From the Side and Emmerdale – reflects with disarming honesty. 'I mean, I come from Surrey… Growing up, there wasn't a lot of diversity, and I think that as open minded as a lot of people are that I grew up with – we, they, all of us – don't discuss the topics of this play as much as I think we should'.Lincoln also highlights the vulnerability at the heart of his performance. 'There's a lot of white guilt that stops a lot of people engaging in the discussion and the discourse. Billy and Harrison have allowed us to talk, and really get into the basis of what is being said. I think that's been a really beautiful aspect of the rehearsal process.' On his character Jesse, Omari Douglas says he's simply trying to make sense of his existence – while also being a Black gay person in America. 'He's making sense of stuff and he's trying to survive.' Douglas goes on to acknowledge that the African American experience is not his own, yet the existence of intersectionality and 'the justification that you have to make for yourself, time and time again' is something that is entirely familiar. 'The play is just truth, through and through.' In thinking of a single image or scene that might stay with an audience long after watching This Bitter Earth, Porter reflects emotionally on the characters' arcs. 'It's a very simple image. It's just sitting at the foot of the stage…' Porter takes a long pause as the scene flashes before him. 'Even those of us who sort of revel in this idea that we're fine alone, that we're independent… that we can do it by ourselves… to have the courage to be vulnerable enough to say, 'I can't do this by myself. And I don't want to actually'. That, for me, is the transformational nature of this story'.As we wrap our interview, a silence lingers. The air shifts, and the room slowly exhales. The spell cast by these four artists in their rehearsal space – thick with honesty and heat – is potent. On stage, in the intimate walls of Soho Theatre, you'll feel it. Deeply. And then some. This Bitter Earth is at Soho Theatre on 18–26 July 2025. The post This Bitter Earth: Billy Porter reveals all about his West End directorial debut (EXCLUSIVE) appeared first on Attitude.
The Guardian
19-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
‘What are you trying to incite?' Billy Porter asks thorny questions with This Bitter Earth
When Billy Porter talks, people listen. They have no choice. The actor, fresh from a stint as Emcee in the London run of Cabaret, and about to reprise the role on Broadway, speaks in a poised, purposeful, regal fashion. Each word is selected with care and weighed in his hand as if it were an avocado in the fruit and veg aisle, the gaps between words so lengthy that it isn't always clear when he has finished speaking. Seated around the table in the south London studio where Porter is overseeing rehearsals for This Bitter Earth, which marks his UK directorial debut, are the playwright Harrison David Rivers and the actors Omari Douglas (It's a Sin) and Alexander Lincoln (Emmerdale). Everyone maintains an attentive silence while Porter is speaking, until there can be no doubt that he has completed his thought. The Guardian's journalism is independent. We will earn a commission if you buy something through an affiliate link. Learn more. 'The … beautiful … part of this play,' he says, easing his feet out of a pair of marshmallow-soft cream-and-ebony moon boots and nudging them to one side, 'is we get to watch two people who love each other try … time … and time … and time … and time again … and they never give up … on themselves … or on love. There is hope … We don't have to be divided. Having conversations that are complicated is what makes the healing happen … without blame … without shame.' This Bitter Earth is a fragmentary, non-linear portrait of the passionate but strained relationship between two queer men in their late 20s and early 30s. The action ricochets back and forth across the years between 2012, when Barack Obama was still in the White House, and 2015, when Donald Trump (who goes entirely unmentioned) announced his own presidential campaign. Neil, played by Lincoln, is a white Black Lives Matter activist described in the dramatis personae as 'an enthusiast [who] means well', while Jesse (Douglas) is a Black playwright upbraided by Neil for his apparent lack of political engagement. Protest, though, can take many forms. As Jesse argues: 'I'm living my fucking life! What else do you want from me?' Once the actors have read through a scene in which Neil expresses disappointment because Jesse gave only a passing greeting to his white activist friends, Porter turns to his actors: 'Great. So what is this about? What bug is up your ass and what are you trying to incite?' While they debate the characters' intentions, Rivers looks on. His play premiered in 2017, and he isn't usually involved in new productions of it. 'It's fun for me to re-meet the play after eight years of living and the world shifting,' he says. Or not shifting. 'I wish it felt different now. You write a play and you hope that you've solved all the problems. The dream is that people will pull out what you wrote and be, like, 'Remember when we didn't respect people and there was violence and we didn't know how to talk with one another?' The play is important now because we can step out of this room and into a very similar world. That's sad. But let's speak to it anew and try again to make a change.' 'We have to keep trying!' booms Porter in his distinctively husky battle-cry. Back to the scene. Lincoln, wearing a grey singlet that shows off his tats, clearly comprehends what his character cannot: 'Neil doesn't see that simply stepping out of your house in the morning can be your protest.' It is an argument with which Porter can readily empathise. 'Living is a protest,' he says. 'Or walking down the street … wearing … a hat. When David Bowie does it, he's a genius. When Kiss do it, they're rock stars. Because they're white.' He peers over the top of his glasses with a disdainful look. 'But it's just a hat. It's … just … a hat. Now shut the fuck up!' In the space of one monologue, Porter has apparently slipped between the roles of director, memoirist and actor, his final admonition addressed to the fictional Neil rather than to anyone in the room. As a directing style, you might call it cubist. Rivers commends Porter for being 'present' and for living 'now, now, now'. He explains: 'I think Billy's urgency is being directed into the play.' When I ask whether the two actors recognise the sort of 'whitesplaining' comments that Neil makes to Jesse, Douglas rolls his eyes: 'Oh God, yes. If I told you about them, we'd be here all day.' I confess that I was wincing too, hearing echoes of myself in Neil's patronising liberalism. 'Why 'wince'?' Porter demands across the table. 'I would encourage you – and I'm not interviewing you here – to take the 'wince' out of it. The openness to having the conversation is the point. 'When you know better, do better,' is what Maya Angelou always said. Now, when you know better and you don't do better – that's when I'm comin' at you!' This Bitter Earth is at Soho theatre, London, until 26 July
