Peanut Butter & Blueberries, Kiln Theatre review - rom-com in a time of Islamophobia

At one point, in John Fowles’s 1977 novel The Magus, the guru character in the story compares sexuality before and after the 1960s. He says that although “young people can lend your bodies now, play with them, give them as we could not”, there is also a loss – “a world rich in mystery and delicate emotion”.

Sexual restraint has its own tender feelings. It is this emotional landscape that lies at the heart of Suhaiymah Manzoor-Khan’s debut play, Peanut Butter & Blueberries, at the Kiln Theatre. It’s a contemporary Muslim love story in which the two lovers never even touch each other.

Set in London, this 90-minute two-hander shows a year in the lives of Hafsah and Bilal, two students studying at SOAS. Both are practicing Muslims from north of the metropolis: Hafsah is from Bradford, wears a turquoise hijab, does gender studies, writes fiction and is bright as a button; Bilal from Birmingham is less confident and less intellectual, but has a strong sense of doing the right thing. They are the classic odd couple, and this gently funny rom-com begins with their meet cute in a seminar where Bilal is doing a presentation on his year of living in Kashmir.

Very soon their platonic rapport develops as they find connections despite their different personalities and experiences. There’s a lovely moment in which they talk about Muslim culture in medieval Spain, over a book about the Alhambra, and amusing scenes such as when Bilal introduces Hafsah to his flat mate Abdulla, and she gently demonstrates her feminist ideals. For all this time, except for a suddenly intense moment when Bilal takes off Hafsah’s specs and cleans the rain from them, the couple never touch, let alone kiss. Yet it is clear they’re in love.

Using a mixture of dialogue and direct address to the audience, Manzoor-Khan writes with superb precision and deep emotional intelligence. I really appreciate the way she shows how both Bilal and Hafsah’s relationships with their parents and family affect their feelings in the here and now. As a poet, the playwright knows the value of silence and restraint as well as words and jokes. As an educator, she is careful to communicate information about the life experiences of being a Muslim in contemporary Britain that is unsentimental and, for the most part (although not completely), avoids clichés about terrorism and Islamism. Anyway, the writing sparkles and its tender romance is beguiling.

But while Manzoor-Khan begins the show with an invocation to Allah the Most Compassionate and Most Merciful, a device that is repeated twice in the playtext, this is not so much a show about Islam as about two individuals whose religious belief has thoroughly conditioned their lives. While their ambitions in life are not really compatible, it’s clear that religion is a consolation as much as a common ground. I’m reminded strongly of Marx’s view of religion as an opiate: “the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of our soulless conditions.”

This sense of religion as a consolation, of a balm in a cruel world, pervades the second half of this rather short, and rather slender story, whose conflicts are as restrained as the playwriting itself. While this successfully evokes a world rich in mystery and delicate emotion, it also swerves away from more violent emotion and more deeper dramatic clashes. So the pleasures of Peanut Butter & Blueberries – a title that refers to Bilal’s taste in sandwiches – are those of discovering, and enjoying, a different world than that which is usually depicted on London stages.

At the same time, there’s a political context of Islamophobia and government schemes such as Prevent. In one scene a harmless chat in a library leads to a dangerous escalation; in another, an innocent request on a train also has hazardous consequences. Manzoor-Khan is good at reminding us that being a Muslim carries very particular uncertainties: it is not just racism; it’s a specifically anti-Islam feeling in our society. If this show is a bit too short and fast-moving to be completely satisfying, it nevertheless makes its points with economy and intelligence.

Sameena Hussain’s production, on designer Khadija Raza’s set, is beautifully paced and uses episodes of movement – from running to bicycle riding – to break up what is a very word-heavy show. With lovely controlled and contrasting performances from Usaamah Ibraheem Hussain (Bilal) and Humera Syed (Hafsah), Indhu Rubasingham’s last production before she goes to the National Theatre is an example both of theatrical elegance and a desire to make contemporary theatre inclusive and groundbreaking in its subject matter. While it is more meditative than noisily exciting, it is also – thanks to the racist violence of this summer – a timely reminder that hope must be stronger than hate.

• Peanut Butter & Blueberries at the Kiln Theatre until 31 August
• More theatre reviews on theartsdesk

@AleksSierz