MARIA DUARTE and ANGUS REID review Materialists, Unmoored, Together, and Bambi: A Tale of Life in The Woods
Freeman, Bristol Old Vic/Touring
Timely indictment of unspoken link between institutional racism and mental-health care
Broken on the wheel of injustice: Freeman
TONY BURKE revels in the publication of previously unreleased tracks by the great US folksinger
GORDON PARSONS endures heavy rock punctuated by Shakespeare, and a delighted audience
STEVE JOHNSON recommends a protest album with a harder edge than many in the genre
DENNIS BROE finds much to praise in the new South African Netflix series, but wonders why it feels forced to sell out its heroine
CARL DEATH introduces a new book which explores how African science fiction is addressing climate change
In his second round-up, EWAN CAMERON picks excellent solo shows that deal with Scottishness, Englishness and race as highlights
THIS tightly woven Strictly Arts production, opening with a series of agonising sequences representing the victims’ tormented fates, initially focuses on the 1846 case of William Freeman, a black New York boy wrongly imprisoned.
Suffering from years of physical abuse that left him permanently brain damaged, on release he senselessly murdered four white people and was sentenced to be hanged, despite his lawyer's plea of insanity caused by his brutalisation in prison.
United by their abusive treatment by police and prison warders, the story of the other characters brings the story up to date with the 2016 death of black woman Sarah Reed in Holloway Prison. Debilitated by mental-health problems, her case revealed abject failings within the penal system.
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