Review: BLOOD OF MY BLOOD, Royal Court Theatre

Photo credit: Marc Brenner

Blood of My Blood is an intriguing piece of theatre, built around the idea that a place can retain the traces of the lives that have passed through it. The concept is beautifully realised, with the architecture of a plantation in South Carolina and its past lives becoming central to the production rather than simply providing its setting. The result is a compelling interplay between place, memory and history, as the boundaries between past and present gradually become less certain. 

Blood of My Blood follows Talulah, played by Jodie Campbell, as she travels from London to to Bullock Creek, South Carolina, following the death of the grandfather who raised her, to reconnect with her family’s history. Staying in the cabin where her ancestors were once enslaved, she finds the past beginning to surface in the form of an ancestor of hers called Ginnie Good, played by Ronkẹ Adékọluẹ́jọ. The play intertwines the two storylines, allowing for a jarring contrast. 

The relationships at the centre of the play provide much of their emotional grounding. The dynamic between Ginnie and her friend has an easy warmth, while Ginnie’s relationship with the John “Doc”, with whom she had five children, is handled with considerably more nuance. 

The production is particularly effective in its ability to move between darker material and moments of comedy. Much of its humour lands through satire, although there are occasions when the writing settles for more conventional jokes, losing some of the sharper quality found elsewhere. 

The technical language of the production is equally important. Lighting and sound are used with considerable imagination to establish the relationship between the two worlds, with lighting creating an increasingly uneasy supernatural atmosphere. 

The material itself feels as though it calls for a greater degree of trust and restraint from its performers, particularly when moving between its comic and dramatic registers. The second act gains momentum as the new year approaches and the possibility of the truth finally emerging begins to take hold. The production’s central themes surrounding the history of slavery in South Carolina, and the wider legacy of slavery in America, are approached through personal relationships rather than exposition, giving the subject an interpersonal dimension that feels both intimate and distinctive.

Blood of My Blood remains a thoughtful and atmospheric piece of theatre. Its strongest achievement lies in the way it makes history tangible: not simply as something that happened before, but as something embedded within places, relationships and the people who inherit them. When the production finds the balance between its humour, its darker material and its supernatural world, it becomes a quietly compelling examination of what it means to live alongside the past.

**** Four stars

Reviewed by: Beatriz Ferreira

Blood of My Blood plays at London’s Royal Court Theatre until 7 November, with further info here.