REVIEW: BIRDS OF PASSAGE by Marcia Kelson at Drayton Arms Theatre 11 – 15 March 2025

‘Sun, sea and the horrors of the migrant crisis’ ★★★

Emma, a young widow, and Bill and Sandra, an older couple, arrive at a beautiful Greek island on holiday. On their first day they witness the bodies of two children being brought onto the beach. The children are refugees who drowned crossing the sea in a flimsy migrant vessel. 

Emma is appalled the more she finds out about the migrants’ plight. Bill is belligerently anti-migrant and thinks they should go back to where they come from. Sandra tries to keep the peace between them, though is clearly more on Emma’s side than her husband’s. As their holiday unfolds, the happy, sun-soaked, sanitised tourist version of the island is juxtaposed with the horrors faced by migrants fleeing lives of violence and poverty in search of safety and a new life. 

Marcia Kelson’s play is an important exploration of a key geopolitical issue of our time. She clearly cares deeply about the topic, and personally I liked the way she exposed the white saviourism that permeates much of the White Western progressive view. However, that led to rather too much expositional writing. The play is peppered with mini lectures with facts and figures which interrupt the dramatic tension. Kelson is clearly a capable writer. The play was at its best in the human interactions between the characters and there was a lot of humour along the way, which is no mean feat given the subject matter of the play. 

There was a lovely chemistry between Milly Walters’ Emma and Maggie Daniels’ Sandra. Jan van der Black was satisfyingly “awful” as the bigoted Bill. There were a fair few icky moments where the actors forgot or fudged their lines. I know it can be hard, but the actors really need to get on top of the script.

The play was let down by the ending, which tried to tie everything up in a pretty, “happily ever after” kind of way. There were at least two points earlier in the second half where the play could have ended, which would have made for a dramatically truer conclusion. 

All in all, there is a lot to like in Birds of Passage. With a bit of reworking and the actors being properly on top of their lines, this could be a five-star show. 

BIRDS OF PASSAGE by Marcia Kelson at Drayton Arms Theatre, 11-15 March 2025

Box Office

Performers: Marissia Petropoulou, Jan van der Black, Maggie Daniels, Christopher Kouros, Milly Walters, Jerome Kennedy

Writer: Marcia Kelson

Director: Penny Gkritzapi

Stage Manager: Harry Molyneaux

Set painter: Ian Salter

Reviewer: Srabani Sen

Srabani is a theatre actress and playwright. As an actress she has performed at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse (The Globe), the Arcola, Southwark Playhouse, The Pleasance and numerous fringe theatres, in a range of roles from Shakespeare to plays by new and emerging writers. She has written several short and full length plays. Her play Tawaif was longlisted for the ETPEP Finborough award, and her play Vijaya was shortlisted for the Sultan Padamsee Playwrights Award in Mumbai.