BY Margaretta wa Gacheru (3.21.2024)
Liquid Arts felt no shame in telling the truth about alcoholism and the cruel impact it has on families and the alcoholic in their recent production, Spot-on.
Focused on the family of Marcus and Petty and their daughter Sharon, we immediately see a troubled home. It starts with the Mama (Victoris Kuwona) arriving home and finding it left in a mess. There is no sense of order or discipline, which she attributes to the house-help Fatma (Sophie Kendi) who is definitely part of the problem. She’s a cheeky worker who is rude beyond words. But her fighting spirit is matched by the Mama’s which prepares her to physically fight back, using her scarf to hit home against the demons that seem to have invaded her house. She’s equally prepared to lash out at her daughter (Irene Mungai), who she also feels is possessed by demons.
But the cause
of the family crisis is clarified once Marcus (Majestic Steve) arrives home and
we see he’s a flaming alcoholic. Once the rock-solid foundation of his family
who was a stanch supporter of educating girl like sharon, now he refuses paying
her school fees.
One of the
most painful scenes in the play is when she pleads with her once-loving dad to
pay up so she could go back to school. Now he brushes her off, claiming her
education isn’t important. He tells her it will never do her any good, the
alchol having made him stupid as well as unkind, unloving, and insensitive towards
those he had once loved.
It’s as if she becomes an orphan
right before our eyes. Irene Mungai deserves recognition for reaching into her
own soul in order to make us feel those painful moments of rejection and
hopelessness.
The next
scene is also significant. Marcus brings home two of her boozy boyfriends, Joe (Moses
Kioko) and Martin (Stephen Mwangi) who also talk about beer as “liquid happiness”.
Yet they seem more inclined to grab
Marcus’s hard stuff from his mini-bar rather than drink the beer which is there
in plenty. Whether they are the ones who hooked him onto the booze or they are merely
colleagues in defeat, one can’t tell
But this is
when the truth comes out and we realize that Marcus was recently sacked for constant
misdemeanors against his company’s Oath of conduct. He has consistently been found
drunk on duty. This is why Tabby (Victoria Mwangi) the company boss chose to
sack him and his colleagues for the same in-house ‘crimes’.
The only
thing that finally wakes Marcus up from his boozy stupor is the discovery that
his supposed friend tried to seduce his daughter. His conscience is finally
roused as he remembers a sense of right and wrong as well as his duty to
protect his child. And seducing his little girl is definitely wrong.
It wasn’t clear if the mom had heard
about Sharon’s seduction. It seems that it only happened after she discovers that
the sexual predator is her boyfriend. She had gone to Martin to help her try to
get back Marcus’s job. She also tried to speak directly to the company boss since
they had been friends many years back.
But she didn’t succeed since Tabby knew Marcus was still in the fog of his
addiction. Unfortunately, Marcus was just at the front door when the topic of divorce
came up between the two women. So once he’d walked into the living room, he was
on the attack against tabby. After the Mama tried to intervene, but only added
hot pepper to the scene, it got so chaotic that she had to throw the man out
and claim she would never see him again
The misery
that was about to ensue after both women ousted the guy would haunt the family
the rest of their lives. The mom would only hear from him through a letter
Sharon received, but chose not to share it with her mom until she realized she
had to since he was speaking to her through a suicide note. It was filled with words
that conveyed his love and sorrow for having failed them as a husband and
father. It was the tragic truth that came too late, even as his family was
prepared to forgive him if his obsession was past.
The ending
of the play, though tragic, was also heartwarming.
One only
wished ‘Spot-on’ could be staged in every Kenyan bar. Even better would be
having the government help everyone get a job.
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