Review: My Uncle Is Not Pablo Escobar, Brixton House

My Uncle Is Not Pablo Escobar starts really promisingly. Four women strike fierce voguing poses in silhouette to a thumping techno beat while a voiceover lists ethnic categories you’d recognise from a survey form – white, Black, Asian, conspicuously omitting Latinx; for that is what these four women are. It’s a sharp, encouraging opening salvo. Then the music cuts and the performers, trapped inside a giant elastic band, play a cultural tug-of-war: English versus South American choices in food, drink, and music. It’s playful, pointed, and suggests a smart exploration of identity.

Then (the captions tell us) we’re in a south London flat in May 2026 (not sure why it’s a few weeks in the future), home to Ale (played by Yanexi Enriquez), whose sister Catalina (Lorena Andrea), an investigative journalist freshly arrived from Chile, arrives on assignment. We then cut to the basement of a bank, where Ale alongside Honey (Nathaly Sabino) and newcomer Lucia (Cecilia Alfonso-Eaton) are working as cleaners. Here, the play seems ready to say something about how Latinx immigrant women are funnelled into invisible, menial work. 

And then a sudden handbrake turn. Without warning, the piece barrels into what feels like a bargain-bin spy/heist movie, the sort of thing that might star Ben Affleck or Halle Berry (or maybe even both). Catalina ropes the cleaners into trying to expose the bank and corrupt bankers for laundering money for a Chilean cartel. At least, I think that’s the plot, it’s hard to be sure.

Voice-overs from the writers intermittently explain things, though the soundtrack frequently drowns them out. Surtitles appear in three languages but are crammed with text, often out of synch with what the actors are saying and gone before you’ve read half a sentence. They’re theoretically there for accessibility; in practice, they’re almost decorative.

Then, if following the plot wasn’t hard enough, halfway through, the actors step out of character and address the audience, who are asked to raise their hands whilst a series of questions is asked. If you get one wrong, you are told to put your hand down. It turns out they are asking sample questions from the British Citizenship test, once again making a point but, out of context from the rest of the play. As an aside, as a British citizen, I failed miserably. 

When we get back to the ‘plot’, there are puppets (well, I think they are puppets – it was very dark and smoky by then), a ‘man’ in a plastic mask who is one of the characters in the narrative, footballs, bean bags, and tiny printers. It is all a bit of a mess. There are speeches about corrupt banks and bankers and some other rhetoric, but it is all fired out like bullets, and I’m not sure I caught everything.

Five writers are credited, and My Uncle Is Not Pablo Escobar often reflects exactly that: like separate plays smashed together and sent onstage before anyone has checked if they actually fit. There’s an interesting and compelling story to be told about the Latinx community in Britain; this just isn’t it.

On top of that, I’ve been suffering with a bad cold this week and thought twice about heading out to Brixton, but I’m a trooper and didn’t want to let anyone down, so I climbed out of my sickbed and went. With hindsight, I think I should have stayed home with a Lemsip and watched a bad spy/heist movie starring Ben Affleck and Halle Berry!

Co-Writer, Project Lead & Festival Producer: Valentina Andrade 
Co-Writer & Spanish Translation: Elizabeth Alvarado
Co-Writer, Co-Director & Spanish Translation: Lucy Wray
Co-Writer & Co-Director: Tommy Ross-Williams 
Co-Writer & Dramaturg: Joana Nastari
Set & Co-Costume Designer: Tomás Palmer
Associate Designer: Victoria Maytom
Lighting Design: Roberto Esquenazi Alkabes
Originating Sound Design: Xavier Velastin
Co-Costume Designer & Costume Supervisor: Isabelle Cook
Movement Director & Choreographer: Myron Birch

My Uncle is Not Pablo Escobar plays at Brixton House until Sunday 3 May.