The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind brings William Kamkwamba’s true story to the West End, and earns its tears

The Boy Who Harnessed The Wind | @Sohoplace until 18th July

Wind power, William Kamkwamba’s true story is a colourful, moving, and insightful new musical.

There are shows that entertain and those that open a window into another world. The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind, now at @SohoPlace in London’s West End, manages to do both, and on the performance I attended, the timing felt uncanny. Record temperatures outside; a story of devastating drought and famine on stage.

The show is based on the true story of William Kamkwamba, a thirteen-year-old boy growing up in rural Malawi in the early 2000s. His family couldn’t afford school fees, so he had to drop out. However, he refused to stop learning. Using old science textbooks from his local library, including one titled Using Energy, he found a picture of a windmill and figured out how to build one from bicycle parts and scrap metal. His neighbours thought he was mad, and even his father didn’t believe in him. But the windmill worked, changing everything, for his family, his village, and ultimately for him.

The story has already been told in William’s bestselling memoir and in Chiwetel Ejiofor’s acclaimed 2019 Netflix film, which Ejiofor wrote, directed, and starred in as William’s father. Ejiofor brings that same commitment to this stage production as Executive Producer.

It transfers to the West End directly from the Swan Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon, and the RSC’s influence is unmistakable. Under their new co-artistic directors, Daniel Evans and Tamara Harvey, this production feels like a genuine statement of intent, a return to the RSC’s broader ambition to produce not just Shakespeare but bold new work. Combined with the growing partnership between the RSC and @SohoPlace, as seen with the successful transfer of Kyoto earlier this year, this production feels significant.

So how does it work as a musical? Very well, for the most part. It is a genuine celebration of Malawian culture, the music, the dance, the costumes. We learn alongside William, gradually becoming immersed in his community and the world surrounding him. There is a wonderful sense of camaraderie at its heart, and the cast is fantastic. The women’s singing, in particular, is brilliant.

I did feel that the men’s voices weren’t quite right on the night I attended, slightly under pitch, as though they were trying too hard. That may well have been a one-off. My main caveat, however, is that the show feels a bit long, the kind of pacing issue that can undo even a play built around real lives and genuine talent. The first act could have been trimmed to get us to the real emotional core more quickly, in saying that acknowledging I may have been in an uncharitable mood.

But when you get there, it is worth it. There are two moments in the second act that genuinely made me cry. One involves a puppet dog, and the other features the real William in his TED talk. Yes, there is puppetry throughout, colourful and imaginative, adding to what is a thoroughly absorbing theatrical experience.
It entertains, it moves, and it provides insight into another culture, another community, and a genuinely remarkable human story.

A genuinely moving and colourful celebration of Malawian culture, The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind is a little long in the first act but earns every tear it draws in the second. The women’s singing is brilliant, the puppetry is a delight, and the story, which is entirely true, is as inspiring as theatre gets.

For another true story given powerful theatrical treatment this year, read the review of Mass at the Donmar Warehouse.

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