King Troll (The Fawn) by Sonali Bhattacharyya. The New Diorama Theatre, 16 Triton Street, London until 02 November 2025,

3***. Review: William Russell.

“Powerful stuff.”

The problem with Milli Vhatia's production is that her cast, especially at the beginning, can be difficult to understand. The first words I wrote were “voice lessons needed.” But in an 80 seat theatre this should not happen and it did in the beginning affect things for me at least. In fact two Asian  sisters, stateless, are living on an island. Nikita has a job of supporting young immigrants, Riya has no papers and is in despair about her future. To help her she is given a supporter in the form of a homunculus – a lanky male figure played superbly by Dominic Holmes, half sinister, have loving and quite terrifying. It opens with a splendid blast of light shattering the darkness the theatre has been plunged into which leaves on aware that what is to come – the world we see is stark, walls of wire fencing, a few pieces of patently discarded furniture – is going to be testing. They are behind with their rent, their landlady Mrs B is threatening them with being cast out, and an old lady Shashi – a fine double by Ayesha Dharker – who is a family friend introduces Riya to the Fawn otherwise Jonathan. What follows is powerful, illuminating about the lives of people seeking shelter in foreign lands from homelands they can no longer live – it probably serves another star in so far as they mean anything but getting to grips with what their situation was and why the Fawn is offered took away from the immersion in a play one needs for it to work. The one sheet cast list could have had a little more information about the stories being told.

Cast

Diyar Bozkurt – Tahir.

Ayesha Dharker – Shashi/Mrs B.

Zainab Hasan – Nikita.

Dominic Holmes – The Faun.

Safiyya Ingar – Riya.

Creatives

Director – Milli Bhatia.

Designer – Yimel Zhao.

Lighting Designer – Ellio Griggs.

Composer & Sound Designer – XANA.

Movement Director – Iskander Shararuddin.

Fight Director – Bret Yount.

Voice Coach – Gurkiran Kaur.