Like a mine full of precious metals, Natasha Mumba’s ambitious debut play “Copperbelt” has valuable material within it. But it needs further excavation to tap its potential and bring it to the surface. And at two-and-a-half hours long, this co-production between Soulpepper and the National Arts Centre’s English Theatre could use more refining.
Eden (playwright Mumba), an ambitious operations manager at a Toronto-based mining firm, is trying to push through a major copper deal in Zambia. Even with encouragement from her older live-in boyfriend and colleague, Peter (Rick Roberts), she struggles to be taken seriously by the company’s leadership. What her co-workers don’t know is that the deal is personal: her father is the wealthy co-founder and CEO of a powerful Zambian investment group. When he suffers a heart attack, Eden returns to Lusaka, and her professional ambitions begin to collide with family loyalties.
There’s a lot of information to absorb in the play’s dense first 40 minutes, including how Eden and Peter met, and (in flashbacks) how their initial sexual relationship evolved into a more serious one, even though Eden still has commitment issues. We also get scenes set in Lusaka, between Chimfwembe Kasuba (Kapembwa Wanjelani) and Dalitso (Kondwani Elliott Zulu), the latter of whom communicates with Eden.
Plus, there’s lots of casually tossed off conversation about copper deposits, cobalt mineralization and the West’s attempt to strike deals with mines before China gets to them. Add in dialogue about licenses, permits and processing fees, much of it spoken in both Bemba and English, and it becomes clear that a mineralogy degree or classes at the London School of Economics — Eden’s alma mater — would come in handy.
Once we get to Zambia, however, the pieces of the play begin to come together. Eden — who is called Chileshe by her family — hasn’t seen her parents, Chimfwembe and Harriet (Warona Setshwaelo), in more than a decade. She reunites with her siblings Lombe (Makambe K. Simamba), who’s married to Dalitso and is a social media influencer, and Musolo (Eric Miracle), a lawyer who’s moved to Australia.
Suddenly, the play becomes a Zambian take on “Succession,” with Chimfwembe announcing he’s going to give up his multi-million dollar empire and bequeath it to his children.
This, at least, gives us something dramatic to chew on, and it’s in the domestic scenes, with characters who clearly know each other, that Mumba delivers her most powerful writing.
The remarkable Zambian actor Wanjelani delivers a memorable story about being the son of a miner and meeting the white man who owned the very large house he now owns in Kitwe. He fills us in on how he built his fortune, essentially taking his country and its resources back from the white imperialists.
Later, Setshwaelo has a moving monologue about the couple’s simpler early life, and you can see the whole arc of Harriet’s ambitions for them — she’s a co-founder of the company — play out in a minute or two.
We also get a telling glimpse into the social and economic stratification of the country as Zulu, who came from a modest background and married into this family expecting to be respected, lashes out.
These are such vivid scenes that they make the first act almost feel like an hour-long prologue.
In the character of Eden, Mumba has written someone who’s as wily as Chimfwembe but also maddeningly opaque. Based on what happens later, we question her professed love for Peter. Is she merely using him to get what she wants? Is she getting back at the perceived global colonizer?
While the ending is deeply satisfying — on opening night it elicited hoots and hollers — there’s something unsatisfying about it too. Perhaps it’s because Eden remains a mysterious, unknowable character. Her parents, although they have less stage time, feel more human.
Nina Lee Aquino’s production is a mixed bag. The contrast between the early scenes in a fancy Toronto condo — where the playing area is cramped in a corner of the stage — and the spacious, airy scenes in Zambia feels pointed, but a little obvious.
Likewise, the literal piecing together of Rachel Forbes’ set to represent the return to Eden’s former world in the latter part of the play reads as too on the nose. And movement director Tawiah Ben M’Carthy’s choreography — perhaps meant to communicate the things left unspoken among the characters — feels contrived.
In her introduction to the play, Mumba rightly points out that most Western stories set in Africa are centered around war, poverty and pain. “Copperbelt” isn’t one of them. But I wish it mined more dramatic depths.
