What's On: They Don’t Really Care About Us
4AM Productions are back after a hugely successful 2023 here to take things to a new level in 2024. Last year, they had a great year firstly taking on Eurovision with the hit show ‘Murder at Cadberry Manor’ that completed a 4 night sold out run at Hope Street Theatre in May. They followed this up with their inaugural horror showcase entitled Book of Horror - Volume 1: Haunting on Hope Street in October which again was sold out and received critical acclaim. 2024 is set to be their biggest year to date with no less than 4 theatre productions and a film in the works. Their latest show comes in May as might just be their most important to date.
Their latest production is is called ‘They Don’t Really Care About Us’, it’s inspired by the famous Michael Jackson song by the same name. The song is all about racial injustice and police brutality. Similarly, this production focusses on racial injustice, treatment by the police, our justice system but also sexism and misogyny in the workplace and society. It is written by Sab Muthusamy and Rachel Louise Clark. It’s Directed by Sab Muthusamy, Rachel Louise Clark and there will also be physical theatre movement put into the show to give it an extra element and this will be directed by George Fragakis. The first ideas of this production was formulated as far back as 2013 whilst Sab was still in university.
“I wrote a dissertation on racial profiling and discrimination by the police and the Stephen Lawrence case was a huge part of that. Whilst doing the research I always had the idea of a story that involved racial discrimination by authority figures and wanted to explore that. It’s amazing that I can now use that research and channel it into this production, it’s almost like I’ve come full circle!”.
In order to bring this story to life, Sab felt bringing an experienced writer on board would help elevate the story and take it to another level and where it needed to be. This is how Rachel Louise Clark came on board.
“I spoke to a few different writers at the start of the writing process. This is a really personal story, a lot of the incidences of racial abuse are based on real life experience by me or people I know so I really needed my co-writer to get it which I appreciate is not easy to do. I’ve known about Rachel’s work for a little while and she is of course well known and well thought of in Liverpool and after we discussed the story and where it could go, I knew instantly she was the absolute perfect fit for the project!”.
Without giving away too much, the story is set in Liverpool in 1997. Vanessa Campbell, a young woman is as aspiring poet. She has released her first book of poetry and it’s a big successes, beyond her wildest expectations. She is the source of great pride and joy to her parents Carol and Graham and younger sister Caitlyn, they are a typical working class Liverpudlian family. One evening, a book launch and q&a has been held for Vanessa and she invites her closest friends a long to support.
Her friends are Dinesh Sharma, George Taylor and Sarah Watson. After the event, the friends go back for a party and the unthinkable happens and she is brutally murdered. All signs appear to point to Dinesh, who is of Indian background. Dinesh is a young man and a medical student and having lost his father, he is also trying to support his mother. Dinesh is charged and jailed as the case grips the city as to whether he did it or have the police wrongly arrested a man and if so why? Have they simply judged him on the colour of his skin. It’s a tense, dark and gritty production that will keep everyone guessing till the end.
After a year of looking for distribution, Dandilicious will finally be curated and available on Amazon Prime, a mainstream platform that is accessible and available at your very fingertips on your smart devices. The film will be available to the public in the UK & USA on 4th April 2024 for audiences to either buy or rent.
You can watch the Amazon Prime trailer to Dandilicious by clicking the following link:
4AM Productions have always tried to do different things and add unique elements to their shows. Once again, this has been done by hiring the amazingly talented George Fragakis as director of movement. “George was an obvious choice to be part of the project” Sab said, “I genuinely think he is a genius and he’s always 7 steps ahead. Sometimes he starts telling me something and I don’t get it but by the end, I’m left in awe that he has been able to piece something amazing together. George has a brilliant approach to directing and is a real advocate for movement in theatre and I felt that would be a really cool addition to the story”. The prison version of the music video of “They Don’t Really Care About Us” formed a great deal of inspiration for movement and bringing out the core themes of oppression through physical movement.
With a cast of 13, finding the right people was always going to be a challenge. Close to 100 people applied to be in the show, the most 4AM Productions have have ever had! After multiple audition rounds and also several self tapes to get through, they finally got their cast together. Some familiar faces but mostly new ones which is exactly what 4AM want, working with as many talented people as we can, giving opportunities to people and most importantly, making new friends! The cast has a great variety in experience with some appearing across many productions all the way to one cast member who has never done any acting before and is actually a dentist but wanted to take on the challenge and they were ready to give it to her! All age groups represented too. As always, diversity and equal representation are the most important factor to 4AM and there is great representation as people of all backgrounds are in the cast which is amazing. They’ve al bought into what we are doing and realise the wider importance of the story and the necessity to tell these stories and bring attention to the themes.
The reaction has been immense, which is immensely rewarding as we can see people are still wanting to support us and our visions. Crucially, an original story such as this, with the core themes being what are they, grab people’s attention and show that audiences do want to see shows like this. At time of writing, nights 2 and 3 are on the verge of selling out, continuing 4AM’s run of sell out shows which is impressive as well.