Log In

Reset Password
BERMUDA | RSS PODCAST

Play delves into the supernatural

First Prev 1 2 Next Last
The cast: from left, Rotimi Martins, Natalie Pereech, Rayann Burrows, Laree Talbot, Lisa Darrell Augustus and Gina Davis. Tyrone Smith is on the floor

Ronald Lightbourne’s friends in Jamaica would scare him with ghost stories as a child.

The tales were full of supernatural beings they called “duppies”, each one more terrifying than the next.

The 69-year-old never forgot them. He’s infused the stories into a play, Wilson’s Weekend, now on at Bootsie’s Place at the Grand.

“The play is about a man named Wilson who returns to his native Jamaica after a long absence,” Mr Lightbourne said. “His return enacts a family curse. Unfortunately he is the only one left in his family so it falls on him.”

Mr Lightbourne spent much of his childhood in the Caribbean. He was born in Guyana and lived in Jamaica, Trinidad, Belize and the Bahamas over a number of years.

His parents, Albert and Violet Lightbourne, were Bermudian Salvation Army officers who moved frequently because of their job.

He went to primary school in Jamaica at 12. The following year he won a scholarship to a boarding school there, Monroe College. It meant he didn’t have to follow his parents around the Caribbean.

“It gave me some stability from my wanderings,” he said. “My parents lived the sort of life where I would come home from school and find my mother packing. My mother would say, ‘We’ve had our marching orders’. We had three weeks to pack and get out.

“I had a lot of heartbreaking episodes where I had to say goodbye to my friends. Some of them I never saw again. Some I did. Facebook has made it easier.”

He was always captivated by Jamaican patois; there’s plenty to enjoy in Wilson’s Weekend.

“It is very musical and picturesque,” he said. “I didn’t set out to write this play in that medium, but it seemed a natural thing to do when I got into it.

“I don’t think the patois will be a hindrance to anyone who doesn’t understand the language. It’s obvious what people are saying.”

The play centres around karma and revenge. According to Mr Lightbourne, they’re common subjects in Jamaican folk stories.

“They’ll say, ‘That deed will come back to haunt him’, and the emphasis is on haunt,” he said. “Part of the agency that is supposed to deliver karma is the spirit world.”

Director Pat Nesbitt said the play is an intense story told in a lighthearted way. Some of the actors have taken instruction in patois from Jamaican friends; others haven’t been able to find a mentor.

“There are lots of laughs,” she said. “Some of the humour comes from listening to the actors trying to speak Jamaican patois. It comes with the disclaimer that the actors are supposed to be people telling a story, not necessarily Jamaicans.”

Mr Lightbourne wrote Wilson’s Weekend while on a trip to Cuba.

“I wrote it while visiting my mother-in-law in Havana,” he said. “I’d usually write at 3am because it was quiet then. The television was off and everyone had gone to bed. Once I got into writing it, I would exhaust myself because I’d be up writing for hours. Havana was a good place to write because the topography reminded me a lot of Jamaica.”

When he’s not writing, Mr Lightbourne teaches music and Spanish. Rotimi Martins, Lisa Darrell Augustus, Rayann Burrows, Laree Talbot, Tyrone Smith, Gina Davis, Natalie Pereech and Mitchell “Live Wires” Trott form cast and crew.

Wilson’s Weekend will run for the next two weekends at 9pm. General admission, $50, include twos drinks. Patron tickets are $70 and include a small gift. Tickets are available from www.ptix.bm, at Bootsie’s, 27th Century and Caesar’s Pharmacy

Here to entertain you: back row from left, Rotimi Martins, Rayann Burrows, Natalie Pereech, Gina Davis and Lisa Darrell Augustus. In front: Laree Talbot, Tyrone Smith, Ronald Lightbourne and Patricia Nesbitt