Amanda Wilkins, 2020 winner of Soho Theatre’s Verity Bargate Award, is the writer and performer of Shedding a Skin. She plays Mayah, a young woman with an unpredictable life. She quits her job, breaks up with her boyfriend and moves into a small flat with an elderly Jamaican woman called Mildred (Mrs T to her face). Their intergenerational platonic friendship is what makes this play so heart-warming; with hilarious one-liners, emotional breakdowns and many surprises in the story- these 90 minutes truly fly by as you take a journey with Mayah as she experiences life with new perspectives.
Shedding a Skin feels real, as Wilkins herself says, she vows the ‘tell the truth’ in her writing. I became so swept up in her characterisation, directed by Elayce Ismail, that by the bows I had completely forgotten she was the only person on stage throughout the show and was expecting a full cast to walk out and admire their standing ovation.
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