Pig Heart Boy at Unicorn Theatre and on tour – review

Malorie Blackman’s novel about 13-year-old schoolboy Cameron whose failing heart is replaced with that of a pig to give him a chance of survival, was a massive success in the late 1990s, spawning a BAFTA-winning BBC TV version, and is now regarded as something of a children’s classic. A mixture of inspirational uplift and sharp wit, it also proved prescient as the first xenotransplantation of a porcine heart into a human body happened just three years ago.

Now Pig Heart Boy comes to the theatre in a fleet, funny, psychologically true adaptation by acclaimed playwright Winsome Pinnock. It’s staged, in a touring co-production between the Unicorn, Sheffield Theatres and the Children’s Theatre Partnership Trust, by rising star director Tristan Fynn-Aiduenu with much of the same dynamic panache and imagination he brought to his calling card smash hit For Black Boys Who Have Considered Suicide When The Hue Gets Too Heavy.

This fully deserves a similar level of success, although it’s aimed at a considerably younger audience. The recommended age for Pig Heart Boy onstage is nine to 13 but I defy any older person not to get caught up in the surprisingly sophisticated storytelling, the cheeky humour, the vitality of the performances, and the potent emotional wallop the play delivers.

Immanuel Yeboah’s likeable Cameron, narrating his own story from the classroom, is cocky and bright, but treated with touching delicacy and care by the otherwise boisterous schoolmates who are aware of his vulnerable health condition, and adored by his best mate Marilyn (Christina Ngoyi, like sunshine in human form). He longs to have the same boundless energy as the other kids, and the opportunity is presented with the potential of this pioneering transplant surgery.

Cam’s mother Cathy (Christine During) is opposed to it while his dad (Akil Young) thinks it’s worth a shot, but they have marital troubles of their own, while Cathy’s announcement of a new pregnancy throws a further cat amongst the pigeons. During and Young are excellent, also doubling convincingly as schoolchildren, and the script and production admirably don’t downplay the human and ethical dilemmas at the core of the story.

Nor do they shortchange audiences on imagination and sheer fun (wait til you see Chia Phoenix as Trudy, Cam’s donor pig, resplendent in glittery pink like she’s just walked out of a night club, or Tré Medley bringing a rockstar swagger to the trailblazing doctor set to perform the operation). Essentially though, Pig Heart Boy asks some pretty complex, emotionally loaded questions of its youthful audiences as animal rights, media intrusion and the subject of mortality come into play. It’s full of hope, but with an intriguing, unsettling ambiguity as to Cam’s ultimate fate.

Fynn-Aiduenu handles the shifts in tone with sensitivity and a vibrant theatricality, wrestling the energy of the cast, the flashy technical elements (Paul Wills’s beating heart-meets-beatbox-meets-tellybox set and Andrew Exeter’s neon-colourful lighting are wonders to behold) and the sense of potential tragedy, into an irresistible, compulsive whole. Yeboah is an authentic find, possessed of a quicksilver magnetism and appealing vulnerability mixed with teen bravado, and provides a young hero to really care about. He also skilfully navigates the tricky course between how Cameron sees himself and how others perceive him.

This really is wonderful; hilarious, uplifting, profound, and, if you’ll pardon the expression, full of heart.