Overview

Anka got in and is here for good. Olufemi is being coached to break back in. Bashir has been here forever but he’s just been sent to limbo. Lisa wants to send them all home. Welcome to England. A journey into to the heart of what it is to be a citizen, and finding a place where you belong. A cutting new play about immigration and exile, and what happens when people fall through the cracks, Routes opens up the borders of friendship and family.

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9781472522610

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Reviews

This thrilling debut play by Rachel De-lahay plugs straight into the jittery heart of multicultural London today ... De-lahay has an alert ear for comic dialogue and her portrait of mixed-race, upwardly mobile twentysomethings on the estate ... crackles with wit as well as moments of deep emotion. The play raises the provocative question of whether it is possible to shrug off the fraught issue of racial identity ... It's a play that combines sharp one-liners with a savvy sense of the way we live now ... One leaves the theatre impatient to discover what Rachel De-lahay will come up with next. Daily Telegraph on The Westbridge In her first play, De-lahay shows an impressively complex vision. Financial Times on The Westbridge Routes is a vigorous and dynamic piece. -- Henry Hitchings Standard 21030926 De-lahay excels in writing streetsmart dialogue... -- Aleks Sierz Stage 21030926 The play expresses, more succinctly than journalism, the moral mess surrounding citizenship and criminal law. The Times 20130927 Routes is a sharp-edged sketch ... It plaits together tales of three young men who feel rejected personally or politically with tales of two white women ... who have ducked and dived into some kind of power. Observer 20130929 In 70 sparky minutes, [De-lahay] examines the murky world of those who want to get in and those who don't want to leave. Sunday Times 20131006 A world emerges of broken homes and young men losing their way as director Simon Godwin gets stunning performances from his cast. Mail on Sunday 20131006

This thrilling debut play by Rachel De-lahay plugs straight into the jittery heart of multicultural London today ... De-lahay has an alert ear for comic dialogue and her portrait of mixed-race, upwardly mobile twentysomethings on the estate ... crackles with wit as well as moments of deep emotion. The play raises the provocative question of whether it is possible to shrug off the fraught issue of racial identity ... It's a play that combines sharp one-liners with a savvy sense of the way we live now ... One leaves the theatre impatient to discover what Rachel De-lahay will come up with next. Daily Telegraph on The Westbridge In her first play, De-lahay shows an impressively complex vision. Financial Times on The Westbridge

Routes is a sharp-edged sketch ... It plaits together tales of three young men who feel rejected personally or politically with tales of two white women ... who have ducked and dived into some kind of power. Observer This thrilling debut play by Rachel De-lahay plugs straight into the jittery heart of multicultural London today ... De-lahay has an alert ear for comic dialogue and her portrait of mixed-race, upwardly mobile twentysomethings on the estate ... crackles with wit as well as moments of deep emotion. The play raises the provocative question of whether it is possible to shrug off the fraught issue of racial identity ... It's a play that combines sharp one-liners with a savvy sense of the way we live now ... One leaves the theatre impatient to discover what Rachel De-lahay will come up with next. Daily Telegraph on The Westbridge In her first play, De-lahay shows an impressively complex vision. Financial Times on The Westbridge Routes is a vigorous and dynamic piece. -- Henry Hitchings Standard De-lahay excels in writing streetsmart dialogue... -- Aleks Sierz Stage The play expresses, more succinctly than journalism, the moral mess surrounding citizenship and criminal law. The Times In 70 sparky minutes, [De-lahay] examines the murky world of those who want to get in and those who don't want to leave. Sunday Times A world emerges of broken homes and young men losing their way as director Simon Godwin gets stunning performances from his cast. Mail on Sunday De-lahay skilfully plaits together several different stories. Guardian an account of bureaucratic absurdity that doesn't hide behind absurdist humour. Time Out London

Author Information

Rachel De-lahay’s debut play at the Royal Court was The Westbridge, which opened at the Bussey Building in Peckham in 2011 as part of Theatre Local, before playing to full houses in the Jerwood Theatre Upstairs. It was awarded the Alfred Fagon Award, while still unproduced. Rachel was part of the Royal Court’s Unheard Voices Writers' Programme and won the 2012 Writers' Guild Award for Best Play. She is currently under commission with the National Theatre Studio, Film Four, and Birmingham Rep.

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