I Miss Amy Winehouse – Brixton House, London

Writer, Director and Performer: Suchandrika Chakrabarti

Suchandrika Chakrabarti was a newcomer to solo stand up comedy when the pandemic brought live performance to an abrupt end. I Miss Amy Winehouse is her first hour-long one person show, a touchingly personal comedy performance looking at loss and grief through the medium of Amy Winehouse.

The production is part of the Housemates Festival at the newly opened Brixton House, the reincarnation of the much loved theatre Oval House, which supported local and new talent and was the jumping off venue for many actor, comedian and performer’s careers. The new venue aims to continue in this tradition with two theatres and five studio spaces that cleverly can be turned into smaller theatre spaces in which this performance is located.

The theatre is located in the heart of trendy Brixton, but if you approach the venue from Brixton Village Market opposite you could be forgiven for thinking that it is just a bar below yet another commercial premises or housing development in a quickly gentrifying area. The building just has the word ‘HOUSE’ on the front and so minimal is the signage even that even after having entered the premises there is no box office but just a bland desk with two A4 pieces of paper propped up telling audiences to queue there for the named shows in the two main theatres. There seems to be no mention of what is showing in the other five spaces and no advertising of upcoming or on-going performances anywhere. One would think that digital screens would be used in a brand new 21st century theatre; a wasted opportunity when the performance spaces are so good.. The signage is so minimal that the desk was unmanned as staff are needed to show audience members where the hidden spaces are. As you come out of the lifts on the correct floor there is zero signage and you need to be directed again by staff. Don’t leave to use the toilet, you’ll have difficulty finding the studio again.

Chakrabarti is warm and engaging from the outset and has an endearing stage presence creating an easy rapport with the audience. She encourages feedback from the start and hosts a quiz on Amy Winehouse so it is fun, though not necessary, to read up on your Amy Winehouse trivia before you come.

The show itself was written during lockdown with Chakrabarti’s motivation being to draw on her own loss and grief of close family members as an act of empathetic support for those who may be experiencing their first encounters with bereavement during the epidemic. Amy Winehouse and Chakrabarti are, or would be, the same age had her idol Amy not died. Chakrabarti draws on this loss and the personal tragedy of losing loved ones in the 00’s when she was in her twenties when she was listening and partying, listening to Amy Winehouse and what should have been the best decade of her life.

Because of this the show feels like it is aimed at an audience younger than her, specifically in their twenties as the insights and reflections feel somewhat amiss to anyone not in that age bracket. The piece feels like it is a work in progress. There is a section on statues that comes about due to the statue of the singer unveiled in Camden, Amy’s old stomping ground, that could be made into a hilarious political hour long show in itself. The political asides in this show feel half hearted and tentative. The show does not feel like it flows at times but it remains warm and intimately personal and provides plenty of laughs.

Runs until 4 May 2022 and continues to tour