When Your Angel Arrives

By Chima Osakwe

When Your Angel Arrives is a play about the immigrant experience particularly in the Western world. Plotted around a black African immigrant who is under pressure from his visiting mother to cast off his Caucasian wife, the play deals with the challenges faced by immigrants and equally touches on cross-cultural marriage and black on black betrayal.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Jun 17, 2011
• ISBN: 9781462028375

Chima Osakwe

Bio. A Nigerian-Canadian, Chima Osakwe is a PhD candidate at the University of Toronto’s Graduate Centre For Study of Drama where he also completed his M.A in 2003. He obtained his B.A (Hons.) from University of Jos, Nigeria in 1995 and received the National Council of Arts and Culture Award to the best graduating student in Theatre Arts. Other awards include University of Toronto Doctoral Fellowship, Ontario Graduate Scholarship and Utrecht University Pre-Doctoral Fellowship. Chima is majoring in Postcolonial Drama and Literature. He has published articles in African literature and several letters on African politics in various journals, magazines and newspapers. As a writer, director and actor he has worked in South Africa, Swaziland and Canada. About the Play When Your Angel Arrives is a play about the immigrant experience particularly in the Western world. Plotted around a black African immigrant who is under pressure from his visiting mother to cast off his Caucasian wife, the play deals with the challenges faced by immigrants and equally touches on cross-cultural marriage and black on black betrayal.

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Copyright © 2011 by Chima Osakwe.

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ISBN: 978-1-4620-2836-8 (pbk)

ISBN: 978-1-4620-2837-5 (ebk)

Printed in the United States of America

iUniverse rev. date: 06/13/2011

Dramatis Personae

EBERE—black male; aged about 35

JANE—Ebere’s wife; white female, aged about 33

AMAKA—Ebere’s wife; black female, aged about 20

NNENNA—Ebere’s mother; black female, aged about 55

OBI—Ebere’s friend; black male, aged about 35

ADA—Obi’s wife; black female, aged about 23

KEN—Amaka’s lover; black male, aged about 25

POST MASTER—No specific gender or race, but of adult age

VOICE OF EBERE’S FATHER

VOICE OF MALE EMPLOYER

VOICE OF MALE FACTORY SUPERVISOR

VOICE OF FEMALE NEWSCASTER

Contents

Situation 1 A plant cannot be taller than the planter.

Situation 2 A land of opportunity but there is a price.

Situation 3 I go out of my house; the next minute the Lucifer enters

and begins to mislead my wife.

Situation 4 I did a foolish thing but please forgive and forget.

Situation 1

A plant cannot be taller than the planter.

EBERE and JANE’ s sitting room. EBERE is seated on a sofa looking dejected, shaking his legs and staring at a piece of note in his hands. JANE is standing beside him, sobbing. A voice over is heard narrating the contents of the note:

VOICE

And finally my son, do not marry from those people who speak through their nose, who look like peeled potatoes. In fact, you should never marry any woman you find there. None of them is well bred. You must return home to look for a wife. The words of elders are the words of wisdom. Beware my son! A child does not compare his testicles with those of his father. Only the wise can read the handwriting of the gods. Only the wise can understand the strange mutterings of the spirits. It’s a pity we cannot see each other again before I die. But stay well my son. It’s me; your father.

EBERE folds the letter and puts it into his trousers pocket. He is staring blankly as JANE ventures to speak, trying to control her tears.

JANE

First it was your father. (Pause). Now it’s your mother. So you have the guts to tell me your mother does not want a white daughter in-law? Is this why your mother has come all the way from home? To prevent our happiness? To torture my soul? What have I done to deserve this? You mean at your age and level of education, you still allow your mother to lead you by the nose?

EBERE

(strongly)

If you are sensible; I mean if at all you