ONCE ON THIS ISLAND

AT THE REGENT'S PARK OPEN AIR THEATRE

WORDS | GOSS MALONE

Rosa Guy's My Love, My Love, or, The Peasant Girl (1985) has embraced its Trinidadian roots to inspire the riveting new Ola Ince -directed theatre piece, Once on this Island. The source novel was itself based on Han Christian Andersen's The Little Mermaid (1837), and inspired the 1989 film adaptation as well as the more recent Disney remake.

It seems fitting that, in this tradition of adaptation and invention, the fabulous carnival costume designer Melissa Simon Hartman has charmed this "whirlwind story of romance and redemption" with extravagant island colours that bring home the oneness of the ocean as well as the fire of the fête.

Once on this Island will preview at Regents

Park Open Air Theatre on 10 May, before opening there a week later and running until 10 June. The epic tale will star Gabrielle Brooks, Stephenson Ardern-Sodje, and Anelisa Lamola, whose characters embark on a quest “to prove that love is more powerful than death”. Stephen Flaherty provides the musical landscape for a story that was a major Broadway hit in the US.

UK audiences will be blessed with an opportunity to immerse themselves in the vibrant, vivacious physical beauty that is conjured when expression and stage combine. On this epic stage, hearing the yearnings of the rebels, Asaka (mother of the Earth), Agwé (god of water), Erzulie (goddess of love), and Papa Ge (demon of death) will, once more, speak and come alive.