Kit Harington explains why his play’s controversial ‘Black Out’ nights are an ‘incredibly positive thing’

Kit Harington has defended his new play promoting performances just for Black audiences.

The Game of Thrones actor, 37, is currently starring in the West End production of Slave Play, which centres on three interracial couples who are part of a graduate student psychological experiment undergoing ‘Antebellum Sexual Performance Therapy’ because the Black partners have stopped feeling attraction to their white partners.

Throughout the play, themes of race, trauma, and sexuality are explored as the legacy of slavery in the United States continues long after slavery was abolished in 1865.

However, a few months ago it courted controversy when it was announced there would be two ‘Black out’ nights during the show’s three-month run.

Some said the dedicated performances discriminated against white people, with then-Prime Minister Rishi Sunak going so far as to call it ‘wrong and divisive’.

However, a few months on Kit has now defended the idea.

During an appearance on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg alongside his co-star Olivia Washington, the actor said he had come to realise it was an ‘incredibly positive thing’.

‘I do believe with this play and what it’s saying that having a place where a certain group of people can come and feel open to laughing or reacting in a certain way, in a safe space for two nights of the entire run, is a great thing,’ he explained.

He continued: ‘Number one, if you are white, no one’s stopping you buying a ticket, it’s not illegal to buy a ticket for that show, if you want to come. It’s saying, “We would prefer the audience to be this”.

‘Number two, I’ve been going to the theatre since I was young with my mum. I’ve only ever really known predominantly white audiences. It is still a particularly white space.

‘So, to have the argument that, “oh, this is discriminating against white people”, is I think vaguely strange and ridiculous.’

Meanwhile, Olivia said she felt ‘supported’ during the show’s first Black out night.

‘To see Black and brown people in a 900-seat theatre, I’ve never experienced that, as an audience member I’d never experienced that,’ she said.

‘So, it was very special for me to experience in doing this play, because it’s difficult subject matter, it can get hard for people to hear.

‘However, to feel supported by this room in a different kind of way felt just – it felt really great.’

During a discussion on the show after the interview, guest Stephen Fry told host Victoria Derbyshire he also supported the initiative.

‘People can look at these events like theatre and opera and could feel like it is not for them. Think about it and how theatre can be opened up. I think it is a completely fair idea,’ he said.

Earlier this year, producers of the play told BBC News the intention of the Black out nights were to ‘celebrate the play with the widest possible audience’.

The Broadway run of the show also had Black out nights, with writer Jeremy O Harris saying that people had to be ‘radically invited into a space to know that they belong there’.

The second of the two Black out performances in London’s West End will take place in September.

Slave Play runs until September 21. Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg airs weekly at 9am on BBC Two during the Olympics.

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