Three Birds

Synopsis

Siblings Tiana, Tionne and Tanika have found themselves home alone. Tiana's keeping it all together by taking charge of housework and homework. But Tionne's experiments are getting stranger and Tanika's starting to act up. As the outside world begins to press in, the three will do anything to keep their secret safe from the adults who come to call. A startling and darkly comic drama about childhood, family and fantasy. Set in South East London, Three Birds by London writer Janice Okoh was the winner of the 2011 Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting.

Our Review:

25 March 2013

There's a certain intrigue and energy in the opening of Janice Okoh's Three Birds. In a compact council flat in Lewisham, three siblings are attempting to decapitate an already deceased chicken. We don’t know why. But this macabre atmosphere permeates throughout this black comedy, winner of the Bruntwood Prize in 2011.

Desperately clutching onto some semblance of the life they know, teenagers Tiana, Tionne and nine-year old Tanika are harbouring a secret. Money is tight and aside from a line of clothes strewn across the sofa, ready to be sold on e-bay, there is no sign of the mother who appears to have abandoned them. After failing to decapitate the chicken, Tionne barricades himself in the bathroom. Self-assured Tanika refuses to eat the dry chicken and has to be placated by the eldest Tiana with dreams of riches, grandeur and a refrigerator that plays Justin Beiber when opened.

As the story unfolds, we witness “selective mute” Tionne ...

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