This tool is unavailable at the moment. Please try again later.
Start planning your production with a cost estimate you can save and share with your team. Just answer a few questions.
This estimator is only for amateur productions. Professional customers should contact the Licensing department directly to enquire about a title's availability: [email protected]
Important: The cost quoted is an estimate only and may differ when you apply for a licence.
A SAMUEL FRENCH, LTD. TITLE
Full-Length Play, Drama / 3w, 2m
Sasha Hails
Possession is a tale about desire. About owning and being owned. About colonising and being colonised. And ultimately about the power of the spirit to escape oppression.
Nominee: The Stage Debut Awards 2023 for Best Writer
Four mother’s lives interweave across continents and time… Kasambayi, recently arrived in the UK from the Democratic Republic of Congo, starts her contractions on the number 38 bus at Clapton Pond, and gives the final push at Victoria. She names her daughter Hope – hope for their new life, hope for their future.
Once Hope is fully grown, her path crosses with Alice, a foreign correspondent with a particular interest in the latest mineral tormenting the DRC: cobalt. But will their budding friendship threaten the safety that Kasambayi has so carefully built for them in London?
Meanwhile Alice Seeley-Harris, a Victorian missionary wife in King Leopold’s Congo has a horrible sense that history is repeating itself.
Present Day
HOPE – 19, Black British Congolese girl. Kasambayi’s daughter. KASAMBAYI – 40ish, Black Congolese, first generation immigrant. Hope’s Mother. ALICE YOUNG – 41, White, foreign correspondent. JOHN DENT – 40ish, White, foreign correspondent. DAVID, GEORGE’S FATHER – 16. DAVID – 22, Hope’s lover. GEORGES – 22, Hope’s son. BUS DRIVER, PARTY GIRL, YOUNG GYM BOY, MORGUE ASSISTANT, CHAIR, LECTURE HALL ASSISTANT
1900
ALICE SEELEY HARRIS – 30s, English missionary wife. JOHN HARRIS – 49, English missionary. NSALA – 22, Congolese man. MERCY – 13, Congolese girl.
“Maze-like and splendid.” – The Stage
“A rich play bursting with ideas.” – The Reviews Hub
“Thoughtful.” – British Theatre Guide
“A seamlessly expressive, informative, funny, touching and anger-inducing play.” – London Box Office
“Possession is a tapestry of memories, an informative and fascinating story, and a beautiful character study.” – The Spy in the Stalls
Possession is Sasha’s first play. Sasha is currently lead writer and co creator on CBBC’s hit fifth series of Enid Blyton’s Malory Towers. Recent work includes Belgravia (Carnival); Midwich Cuckoos (HBO/SKY) and lead writer of Netflix/Nutopia 6 part series The Last Tsars, ...