Grimeborn: Dreamscape – Arcola Theatre, London

Writer: Rickerby Hinds

Directors: Rickerby Hinds and Mxolisi Masilela

Dreamscape is a short, exhilarating burst of creative energy featuring stellar performances by Kim Blanché Adonis as Myeisha and Kgwadi Tshwarelo Selolo as beatboxer and coroner.  It’s a show that makes you rejoice in the sheer exuberance of Myeisha’s love of life, even as you know that it ends tragically.

Dreamscape is based on a shocking event in Riverside, California in 1998, when a 19-year-old African American woman, Tyisha Miller, was shot in her car by four police officers when she was unconscious. Writer and director Rickerby Hinds uses the language, movement and rhythm of hip-hop theatre to tell a story in a way that transcends the bleakness of the all-too-familiar tale of institutionalised racism

Adonis is mesmerising as Myeisha – full of cheeky teenage life, music, poetry and dance coursing through her veins. When we first see her, she asks us if we’ve ever had the experience in a dream of wanting to scream, but finding nothing comes out. We nod approvingly, but it’s only when the play circles round to the same image at the very end that we get its full impact.

Her narrative begins at Christmas time, soon moving onto the series of little incidents that lead to her being alone in a broken-down car. Events become blurry, her friend going off to call 911 as Myeisha seems to have lost consciousness. To get the emergency services to come, the friend adds the imaginary detail of there being a gun on her lap.

At this stage, Selolo appears, beatboxing his role as Officer Garland, holding a microphone in his extended arm as if it’s a gun. There’s a striking clash between the two spoken registers – his lifeless police-speak versus the language of Myeisha’s endlessly colourful playfulness. But the real political kick is when we realise that Garland is simply inventing what he claims to see in the car in order to justify his decision to shoot.

The extraordinary heart of the play is an even more powerful contrast.  Selolo becomes the coroner, coldly and deliberately recording first one, then another and another of the gunshot wounds found on Myeisha. The audience gasps as each numbered shot is described. But Myeisha continues to tell us her story – delightful accounts of her brief adolescence, of creating her dance moves with her two best friends, of first kisses, her first sexual experience. Her energy and vitality shine through, making all the more intense the tragic end we know is coming.

This production of Dreamscape, co-directed by Rickerby Hinds and Mxolisi Masilela, was garlanded with praise at last year’s Edinburgh Fringe. Catch it at the Arcola while you can.

 Runs until 8 August 2026