IT’S February 25 1964 and Cassius Clay is celebrating becoming world heavyweight boxing champion in a Miami motel room.

With him are three other iconic black Americans in Kemp Power’s fascinating play, which speculates about a meeting between them that actually took place.

All are at decisive points in their lives. Clay is about to join the radical Nation of Islam and change his name to Muhammad Ali, while Malcolm X, Clay’s spiritual and political mentor, is on the verge of a break from the same organisation.

Sam Cooke has just released his last and most emotionally expressive album and Jim Brown is deliberating on the end of his spectacular career with the NFL.

The encounter, watched over by Nation of Islam security guards and spied on by the FBI, starts as a paean to Clay’s achievement in beating Sonny Liston and develops into a powerful exploration of their contrasting responses to racial injustice.

Conor Glen’s boxer has all the bravado and mannerisms of the young Clay, his youthful exuberance and banter an effective counterbalance to Christopher Colquhoun’s earnest and troubled Malcolm X, whose articulacy and sober judgements question each man’s role in the struggle.

Matt Henry gives a stunning performance as a flamboyant Sam Cooke — his renditions of several songs bring the house down — while Miles Yekinni’s Jim Brown proves to be a politically astute observer to the tensions between the singer and the preacher.

All four actors create vivid, compelling depictions of these charismatic and strong-willed characters under Matthew Xia’s direction, while Ciaran Cunningham’s lighting transports the action out of the naturalistic hotel setting for the re-enactment of Clay’s fight and Cooke’s musical numbers, giving an already highly dramatic production a dazzling, celebratory quality.

The ending, somewhat abrupt, only hints at the events overtaking the characters later that year. But, as a dramatisation of a unique meeting, this production has heart, head and soul.

Runs until June 29, box-office: bristololdvic.org.uk, then transfers to HOME, Manchester from July 2-5, box office: homemcr.org.