REVIEW: WOMAN BUSINESS at the Jack Studio Theatre 23 – 27 June 2026
‘vibrant and playful’ ★★★
“Woman Business” is ambitious. The one-person play sets out to explore four distinct stages of Diya’s life within its tight seventy-minute runtime: her time as a precocious twelve-year-old dreaming of nabbing her friend’s hand-me-down saris; her experiences as a wife and mother after moving to London; her attempts to grieve under the watchful (and often judgemental) eyes of her family and friends in later life; and finally, her time as an older woman who can no longer separate the real from the mythical, or the present from the past. In many ways, the play is reminiscent of Eline Arbo’s “The Years,” particularly in its exploration of the multitudes that exist within one person across a lifetime.
There is a lot to enjoy about the play. Under Frances Bodiam’s direction, the production is vibrant and playful. The stage is bedecked with colourful fabrics. Shelton Wong’s lighting design complements this with multicoloured light sequences that are reminiscent of a disco. Similarly, Nick Wells’s sound design is lively and vivid, bringing to life soundscapes that range from the bustling streets of Mumbai to the stifled silence of a hospital ward. Above all, actor-writer Shilpa Varma’s energetic performance gives the play a much-needed dynamism. I especially enjoyed Varma’s portrayal of twelve-year-old Diya: she plays her with a gusto and innocence that made me instantly take to the character. The play also spotlights a number of themes that feel important – most centrally, the experiences of a South Asian woman navigating womanhood, migration, and family expectations. Personally, I found it fascinating to gain insight into cultural traditions and Hindu practices and beliefs that were unfamiliar to me.
However, I found the focus of the play somewhat dispersed. There is a great deal introduced across the four timeframes that could have provided the fuel for a compelling piece of drama: a woman’s changing attitudes towards marriage; how someone who marries young navigates the feeling that her ambitions have been stifled; the expectations placed on widows around what constitutes “appropriate” behaviour; and mother-child relationships. However, while the play very effectively plants all of these threads, few feel developed. Similarly, it felt as though none of Diya’s relationships had the space to deepen. Soon after a potentially fascinating relationship is introduced – be that between Diya and her mother, husband, or children – the play jumps forwards in time, leaving much of that dynamic behind.
As an audience member, I wanted something to hold onto and follow across the four stages of Diya’s life, but instead the different sections often felt disjointed. I was left unsure why these particular moments were the ones we were made privy to, and what the overarching dramatic thread connecting them was.
Nonetheless, it is a pleasure to spend seventy minutes with Diya, particularly because of the warmth and energy Varma brings to the role.
Woman Business
Jack Studio Theatre
23 – 27 June 2026
Box Office https://brockleyjack.co.uk/jackstudio-entry/woman-business/#toggle-id-3
written and performed by Shilpa Varma
directed by Frances Bodiam
presented by Footfalls Theatre Company
Photo credit is Anna Mclaren
