What the Cast of ‘School Girls; Or, The African Mean Girls Play’ want you to know about their new show
After sixty productions across the US, the UK première of School Girls; Or, The African Mean Girls Play debuts at the Lyric, Hammersmith on 14th June, running until 15th July. This critically acclaimed smash hit comedy written by Jocelyn Bioh, one of America’s most exciting writers and directed by the winner of the 2022 Stage Debut Award for Best Director, Monique Touko is a show that explores and celebrates African sisterhood. As I chat to cast members, Francesca Amewudah-Rivers and Bola Akeju in between rehearsals, it is clear from their easy, giggling rapport that this show will be a lot of fun to watch – the pair have the playful relationship of longtime friends so it’s easy to see how this chemistry will translate onstage.
MR: Can you tell me a little bit about the play and your characters Mercy & Gifty and how the whole experience has been so far.
Fran Amewudah-Rivers: It's been a really beautiful process to be in a room of Black women, which is something you definitely can’t take that for granted as creatives in this part of the world. Our characters, Mercy and Gifty are the youngest in the girl group, so they bring a youthful, lively energy to the group, whilst also really trying to fit in with the older kids. It’s like when you’re in Year 3 and you’re looking up at the Year 6’s like, ‘Wow, they’re grown! I want to be like them.’ They provide the humour and the levity in what is at times a very heavy and complex show. So it's been great to be able to lean into the comedy and the humour of, Black girls through these characters. They’re also cousins – Gifty lives with Mercy so it's definitely like a sisterly, sibling kind of relationship. Gifty is very dependent on Mercy to guide her and affirm her … luckily Bola’s alright, so it’s not been too difficult to act alongside her I guess.
Bola Akeju: Yeah, it’s definitely been easier with Fran here since we actually knew each other before. This production is definitely really important. I just hope that all the people who went out and watched For Black Boys will show face for us too. I hope that even people who feel left out of the conversation, i.e. maybe white people/non-black people will be encouraged by the heart behind this story. We're not trying to educate anyone, we're trying to tell a story. If you get educated from it, that's great. That's a bonus. I just want you to hear a point of view that you're probably not aware of, in regards to Black female beauty and the pressures of westernised beauty standards that we are often taught to uphold as women. They're very unrealistic and quite frankly stupid.
MR: I love that although some of these themes of sisterhood and expectations of beauty are universal, it is all very specific to this particular setting of a school in Ghana in the 80s. Fran, you're Ghanaian and Nigerian and Bola, you're Nigerian. So what does it mean to you to be portraying these specifically West African characters at the Lyric in Hammersmith?
FR: Honestly, such a blessing. How often do you read a script where you think, ‘That could be my family?’ I’ve never read a script set in Ghana so it’s been really special. African stories don’t always get the recognition and the care that they deserve. There’s a lot of erasure that goes on within the entertainment industry of certain narratives so it’s great to be involved in telling different kinds of Black stories. These girls aren’t bonding just because they're Black, they just go to school together; this is their everyday life. Any struggle or strife they go through, comes through in the mundanity of the everyday because that is their reality.
BA: There’s a lot of chat these days about Black ‘trauma’ stories and how people are tired of watching shows and films about Black struggle. But the joy and the struggle are intertwined. This is a funny show but it’s also a complex show. Even though it’s set in 1986 and we’re talking about issues from that time such as the use of bleaching creams, these are still problems, people still use them and it needs to be spoken about and we can’t ignore that.
MR: So, when I first heard about this play, the title really grabbed me. Mean Girls, the movie, is at this point more or less the Canon of teen girlhood. But teen girlhood on screen and on stage is so often seen through the lens of whiteness and blondeness. I’ve been seeing the posters advertising the show at Oxford Circus station and it’s been really amazing to see this image of five Black women sporting their natural hair in their school uniforms under a banner with this title. What does it mean for you guys to be sort of reframing the canon and turning it on its head in this way.
FR: This play is set in 1986, before Mean Girls is set so there’s a bit of a question there as to who decides what is part of the canon and whose story gets to come first. This dynamic between girls is a universal story. I like to think that we’re showing audiences that what you think Mean Girls is (a story for and about white women) is a story for everyone as we can all relate to those kinds of dynamics. Why can’t a group of girls from Ghana be mainstream? Why shouldn’t they be as popular or “relatable” as Mean Girls. Though this show is set in Ghana and it's very true to the culture, it's very specific to a culture, though they’re African girls, everyone can relate to the story they’re going through and their experiences.
BA: Well it’s interesting because in the original Mean Girls movie, the Mean Girls are mean but everyone still wants to be them. Their blondeness, skinniness, whiteness makes them that much more attractive even though what’s coming out of their mouths are horrible. In the play, given we’re all Black women, there are other factors at play for what constitutes the girl everyone wants to be. For example, the girls deem Paulina the prettiest in the group but that’s more to do with her age and confidence and the fact that she has a life outside of Ghana. It took our writer Jocelyn 10 years to write this play but the title itself doesn’t give too much away. I was thinking earlier how the first part of the title is also a verb: ‘School girls’ and how this could also be seen as a tool to educate young women.
MR: Woah, I love that idea! I know that there’s a Black Out Night planned on 19th June for a solely Black audience. How important is it to you for young Black girls to come and watch this play.
FR: Very important. Everyone likes to see themselves reflected in the world. We have to continue to create mirrors of ourselves in truthful, honest, layered representations, especially in environments where we don't see that all the time. So, it is definitely important to us for Black girls to come and see the show. I'm really excited for that exchange, when it does happen. In our cast, we have women of different ages, who went to drama school a long time ago, and a lot of the consensus when we were doing a lot of the text work in week one was like, ‘Wow, if I had had a script like this at drama school…’, or ‘If I had seen a show like this when I was younger…’ So it's amazing to be able to be part of changing the status quo, of what we see on stage and like, what kind of stories we see on stage, but not just, at a surface level. The crew, the writer, director, assistant director, composer, our hair & makeup designer – there were so many Black women and Black people involved with the creation of the show from beginning to the end. So it really is very, made by us, for us, for everyone.
BA: The support that Black men get in the industry is so beautiful and well-deserved. We’ve seen people come out to support For Black Boys… in droves and they’ve had sold out shows and been nominated for and won awards. Black women are always there supporting and now we’re at the forefront, we need that to be reflected. We hope to see it happen.