FringeReview UK 2026
The P Word
Bush Theatre
Genre: Contemporary, Costume, Drama, LGBTQ+ Theatre, Mainstream Theatre, Political, Queer Theatre, Short Plays, Theatre
Venue: Holloway Theatre, (Main Bush Space)
Festival: FringeReview UK
Low Down
Waleed Akhtar’s 2022 two-hander The P Word returns in a twice-revised form to the Bush Theatre’s main Holloway space, directed by Anthony Simpson-Pike till June 27. Waleed Akhtar himself returns as Billy and Esh Alladi is again Zafar.
A bold yet tender exploration of what it is to be gay, Asian and humane. You come out cheering. A must-see.
Review
A man glowingly confident in his London skin checks the “local talent” on Grindr; amusedly notes a twink who’s “down with the brown”. Another man mourns his murdered lover, has barely managed to escape from a village near Lahore. Now he’s an asylum seeker. They tell stories in parallel but for 30 minutes there seems nothing parallel about their lives. Waleed Akhtar’s 2022 two-hander The P Word returns in a twice-revised form to the Bush Theatre’s main Holloway space, directed by Anthony Simpson-Pike till June 27. Waleed Akhtar himself returns as Billy and Esh Alladi is again Zafar.
The brilliance of Akhtar’s play is how the lean storytelling flips. It’s initially backstory and present, rippling with timelines and memory. Then it ignites. A rapport of opposites after Zafar takes care of a drunk Billy when they meet at Pride lights up things both have hidden for too long. The scene with its ruthless moments is something Billy’s used to. Homophobia less so, and Zafar’s past and present (the authorities) show both where it lurks.
Gym-toned Billy, or Bilal, inflects a familiar London gay scene; and his nervousness: “sometimes the Pakistani just slips out” shivers as a kind of shame. Bullied at school for being fat and gay, Billy’s transformed himself. There’s sassy workplace quips where Billy’s tipped for promotion, but. And there’s Fat Jason, who turns out not the dork he’s taken for: offstage characters aren’t just incidental detail.
Whilst Zafar’s story is more recessed because more painful, slowly it emerges they’re not so very different, though classic opposites. Billy’s family tolerate his being out, Zafar’s want to kill him. Horrors of the past are filleted with evils of the hostile environment in the Hounslow processing centre, and elsewhere.
About 34 minutes into the 95-minute play the two meet and the whole drama shifts. There’s a few more monologues but it’s a gear-change like something taking off, a resonant enough simile here.
Akhtar’s particularly strong on the intersectional: how wisps of racism within the gay community and homophobia tighten to tendrils. But Zafar’s faith challenges Billy’s dormant one too, and their cultural exchanges are both hilarious (Zafar notes in New Bollywood they do kiss) and profound. There’s moments when the audience cheer as the British are blamed (not least for exporting homophobic laws to the empire). Though as Zafar reminds Billy early on: “I’m not in your Britain. I’m in another Britain.” Not even Brighton can bridge that.
Max John’s circular dais stage, split with each opposite end tilted up, allows the storytelling to land with minimal props fished out of stage hatches. Elliot Griggs’ lighting reins back till crucial moments, at Brighton’s Bar Revenge (as you’d expect) and more spectacularly where Xana’s sound design (mostly pulsing with Niraj Chag’s music) comes to life in a different way: in the last 10 minutes.
Akhtar’s enriched the storytelling, crafting it towards an increasingly dramatic climax that stays the same. An epilogue, after a Bollywood-style ending, is a rug-pull, not of characters but of everything we’ve seen. When Bilal met Zafar is an ending we’re allowed, but Akhtar demands more of us.
As Billy/Bilal, Akhtar is consummate: pumping attitude, wired to the scene, whip-lash-smart (one older man says he himself deserves abuse, which affects Billy), quick-witted and funny. Alladi’s grounded, thoughtful and receptive Zafar can tap his own suffering. Alladi radiates stillness and dignity. It means Zafar’s far more attuned to listening, which Billy appreciates. Wholly in synch as you’d expect after several runs, Alladi and Akhtar are also ideally tuned to their characters’ opposite poles of energy, intimacy, and anger.
The P Word covers much ground and can’t explore everting equally. But that gives it its limber tension and acceleration as well as keeping it focused on the two men. The hostile culture of asylum-seeking is vividly etched, though addressed at the end as if it were even more central to the core dynamic than this version allows. A freshly-thought revival though, and a bold yet tender exploration of what it is to be gay, Asian and humane. You come out cheering. A must-see.
Associate Director Adam Karim, Costume Designer/Associate Set & Costume Designer Maariyah Sharjil, Casting Director Jatinder Chera, Dramaturg Deidre O’Halloran, Marketing & Events Consultant Hamza Jahanzab, Production Manager Ian Taylor for eStage, CSM Rebecca Natalini, ASM Dynzell Muguti.
Producers Tan France, Dr Ranj Singh, Seventh Productions Chuchu Nwagu Productions.
For Bush Theatre: Lead Producer Emma Halstead, Marketing Campaign Lead Kelly Thurston, Head of Technical & Buildings Jamie Haigh, Press Manager Martin Shippen.
