Artistic director Kane Husbands: 'What kind of PappyShow is this?'
Artistic director Kane Husbands: 'What kind of PappyShow is this?'
Kane Husbands is the founder and artistic director of The PappyShow, a physical ensemble theatre company with an award-winning production, BOYS, coming to the end of its run at The Barbican. An hour before curtain up, he reflects on the many faces of masculinity, the joy of collaboration and future of theatre and storytelling.
“I can’t believe it,” Husbands says, laughter crackling on the recording, “we started BOYS without funding, in a disused warehouse with nothing, just me and my friends in this old space - when we rolled up the carpet, lots of mice ran out - and now we’re at The Barbican!”
An unscripted show and the first creation from the company, BOYS explores the tender, childish and dark side of masculinity through meticulous choreography and performance, and emerged out of years of ‘sunday sessions’ where Husbands would invite friends and performers to collaborate. During its debut run, the show picked up the Vault Festival Origins Award for Outstanding New Work in 2018. Because the show is built on collaboration and shared experiences, over 30 men have participated in its creation, something that is important to Husbands' creative style.
"I'm all about people and sharing and working on things together," he says. "That's how I started".
Husbands grew up a sporty child, a keen swimmer and runner but wasn’t into theatre or choreography. To honour a bet with his drama teacher, he applied for The National Youth Theatre at 16, and got in.
"It changed everything for me," he says, “I’d never experienced anything like it, being in a company or a community, you’re not the star, you’re just part of the company, and I loved that. I’ve worked for them every year since I was 16 or been in something with them - that's half my life”.
After studying European Theatre Arts at Rose Bruford College, Husbands made his way as a movement director, and has worked at a variety of venues including the National Theatre, Chichester Festival Theatre, Nottingham Playhouse, Sheffield Crucible Theatre, the Old Vic, the Midlands Arts Centre and West Yorkshire Playhouse. While The PappyShow was still a pipe dream, Husbands was working on the London 2012 Olympics opening ceremony, directing and collaborating with 180 performers. A core group of likeminded creatives regularly stayed after hours to create work with him, forming the first members of the company.
“I want to add to the conversation in a different way”
The PappyShow officially launched in 2013 after a season of soul searching for Husbands; he, along with 12 others, was made redundant from his post at NYT, and decided to go and visit his family in the Caribbean for the first time.
“It was a bit of an ‘end of the chapter’ moment,” he says. “Then I went on a bit of a life-changing trip to meet all my family and cousins. I went for two months. Experiencing the streets my grandfather used to walk down, hearing all of those stories, it was amazing”.
The trip inspired a rethink about his artistic direction, and the name of his company, a name that causes his family to erupt with laughter.
“Pappyshow is a Caribbean word - it means foolishness, or nonsense and it’s the thing my cousins say the most. They’re like - what kind of pappyshow is this, or you are a pappyshow, this is a pappyshow - all the time. And it just felt like the right word for us.”
“There was nowhere in London I could go and use these skills, and be in an ensemble and play with people. I thought maybe I need to do something myself, I can’t just rely on other people to give me chances to do the work I love”.
Husbands negotiated a space with the National Youth Theatre to use on Sundays, and began to grow a company and a community.
BOYS was born out of his interest in gender, and research with groups of men, which sparked conversations about shared experiences, both joyful and shame-ridden.
“I’m not interested in trauma stories,” Husbands says, “lots of other people do that stuff and they do it really well - but I want to add to the conversation in a different way.
“You hear the same things again and again and again and then you have to make something about it. There had to be something about discipline; all the Black men I’m speaking to are talking about getting hit when they were kids - that's something we need to talk about, or being guilted, or stories about those coaches who believed in you when you were at school - it's a key part of growing up.”
The show was also inspired by Husbands’ personal recollections, and changes within his family dynamic.
“what are the things we learn being a young men of colour? What are the things you get told?”
“I had a nephew who was born, and I watched how he transformed our whole family - he is so loving and cuddly and open, [he is] so joyful".
Around the same time, his grandad moved into a retirement home, and Husbands noticed he seemed lonely, and to say “less and less” without a community around him.
I wanted to know - how do we go on a journey from this to that, and what would the intervention be, because I do not want to be like that. I want to have people around me - community and friends - I found it so sad, and I thought there has to be something that shifts that."
Vivid childhood memories also sparked certain sequences in BOYS.
“When I was around five or six, I remember my dad saying I was no longer allowed to kiss him when I went to bed - I had to shake his hand. I don’t know what prompted that, but it made me wonder, what are the things we learn being a young men of colour? What are the things you get told? It just provoked so much research, and got me to thinking about how men are with other men, why don’t we talk about feelings, why don’t we share stories about joy, or what we loved when we were little and who we wanted to grow up to be? Why don’t we do that?”
His full time job as a lecturer on the Performance Design and Practice course at Central Saint Martins seems him foster the love of ensemble creation in his students.
“I really love it because a lot of the people there don’t want to be performers, they want to make performance - a lot of it is thinking about how are we going to use bodies in the space, or how directors and designers will work with performers. And the mad ideas they come out with! It's amazing, I can’t wait to see what they do.”
In addition to taking BOYS, and GIRLS, the sister work to the debut, to the Latitude Festival this summer, Husbands intends to tour What Do You See and has a new work in the pipeline, Black Girl Magic. Although optimistic for the future of theatre, he is keen to see more theatre movers and shakers deliver on pledges that were made during the pandemic, and in the wake of Black Lives Matter.
“We saw a lot of reflection, a lot of introspection, a lot of promise, people committing themselves, but are we going to see all that stuff actually come into practice? Now’s the time if so.
“It’s not just about doing one thing just once - we’re seeing some amazing things, some amazing programming - but will it stay, will we be continuous with that? Or will we go back to what we knew, in terms of representation?
“I’m seeing changes in the content we’re putting on - don’t know if I’m seeing it in the strategies people have of how they work and relate to each other, or a change in the expectations we place on people. There’s a lot of talk a lot about radical self-care but why are we still working 6 days a week? Is that sustainable for people with families? We were able to pause the world for a year - you can’t tell me it can’t be different”.
He hopes the upcoming generation of theatre makers will take advice from Nike and “just do it - don't wait and think about it” and find the value in “playing and finding the silliness and fun”.
“We’ve got more words to talk about our pain than we do our joy,” he says. “I want to change that a little bit. I’m sure we can - there are so many stories to tell”.
BOYS ends its run at The Barbican’s Silk Street Theatre on 23rd April - grab a ticket while you can.