The dream comes alive

Last week Delory Brown, better known to Vision4life contacts as Gaius from Welcome to Corinth, starred as Martin Luther King Jnr at the Lawrence Bately Theatre in Huddersfield. As part of Black History Month, this was also a local celebration of talent. The programme began with a young rap poet, Samuel Wyatt, who has won prizes for his poems. He was followed by a local choir, the True Colours Gospel Choir who sang some of the songs from the civil rights era.

The Dream Comes Alive was a fictional interview between MLK and Moira Stewart, played by Huddersfield actress Lindsay Pascall, and accompanied by archive footage of King.

Brown had obviously done a lot of work to prepare for this role, which he did superbly. The cellar theatre is a small space and this was really the only drawback of the whole evening. Brown could easily have filled a bigger space and indeed it was a shame that he did not have the opportunity to do so. Speaking for alomost the entire time, with only questions interpolated by Pascall in her role as the well known newsreader, King/Brown began be recalling his early life and inspiration. There were many young people in the audience and everyone was hooked by his portrayal of the man who for some many epitomises the Black struggle. He then reviewed the main tennents of non violent resistance and ended with a glimpse into the future: what would MLK have made of the war in Afganistan?

Brown himself has an imposing physical presence and when he stood to give the final 'I have a dream' speech it was clear that he could have benefited from a bigger space in which to perform. The speech itself is well know and it was wonderful to hear the sentences rolling across the audience, including as it does so much 'Remembered Bible'. All together this was an excellent evening and if your local community decides to remember Black history month this way then look no further than Delroy Brown to fill the role. Failing that opporunity you can still catch his portrayal of Gaius on the Vision4life website: http://www.vision4life.org.uk/ (and go to the download DVD section).