How to embrace diversity without signalling your virtue

Cost of Living
Hampstead Theatre, London

No decent person would argue with the demand for more diversity of characterisation – and, therefore, actors – in theatre. Such investment, though, can entail a dramatic cost. The fictional figures who make the most impact often do so because they are complex, venal, even evil. So if a character is conceived out of sympathy – to better represent people of colour or with a disability – the risk is that people conceived to be well-meaning may fail to be well-rounded. Privately, BAME and disabled actors complain about going from not being cast at all to only being asked to play saints or flag-wavers.

Thankfully, Cost of Living, which won the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Polish-American dramatist Martyna Majok, uses smart strategies to succeed in being diverse without simply advertising virtue.

The play begins with someone who could have turned up in an American play from any of the last four decades. Eddie (Adrian Lester) is an African-American truck driver, who delivers a 10-minute monologue about coping with the death of his wife, Ani (Katy Sullivan).

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