Review: Lessons on Revolution, Barbican Theatre
In 1968 the London School of Economics (LSE) went through a period of temporarily closure as its administration attempted to fight back against a wave of student opposition. Newly appointed Director Walter Adams was a controversial and heavily opposed figure, arriving from a role at the University College of Rhodesia and Nyasaland and bringing with him connections to the colonial rule and white minority regime in Rhodesia. Adams became a symbol for a bigger problem – the university’s well-documented links to apartheid regimes around the globe.
Lessons on Revolution, Barbican Theatre. Image credit credit Jack Sain
Lessons on Revolution, a self-described piece of ‘documentary theatre’, digs into the archives of this period of history and draws parallels with contemporary issues of inequality and injustice – the LGBTQ+ movement, the housing crisis in London, migrant rights, protests against the genocide in Gaza. It is an adept two-hander written and performed by friends Samuel Rees and Gabriele Uboldi, our teachers for this hour-long lesson on the history of Rhodesia, the life of Walter Adams and the main figures in the LSE student protests. Their storytelling shines a light on the complex web of immorality that connected LSE’s Directors to oil giant BP, and the institution’s attempts to quell student dissatisfaction by shutting the university down.
Rees and Uboldi are confident, likeable performers. They warm the audience up before the showbegins by handing out tea and biscuits and enlisting audience members to participate throughout by stepping on stage to read lines as various characters, a clever way to bring more voices into the production. Armed otherwise only with an old-fashioned slide projector and some material from the LSE archives, the pair do a valiant job of tacking a complex subject – but at times the storytelling feels rushed and detail is lost as we jump from person to place without stopping to dig beneath the surface.
Lessons on Revolution, Barbican Theatre. Image credit credit Jack Sain
In the second half of the production, politics and history become personal. Rees and Uboldi start to introduce elements of their own experiences: living in a damp, overpriced rental property that hasfailed to comply with its HMO license, and Uboldi’s conversations with his Italian grandfather, a man who voted to support abortion rights in the 1950s but today would not be able to accept his grandson’s sexuality. They are brave, resonant stories that would speak to many other young people navigating life in London. However, their links to the wider history and the 1968 protests feel increasingly tenuous, and the pair’s attempts to ground the story in the modern day fall flat.
Lessons in Revolution is an ambitious, experimental piece of theatre that seeks to use the voices of the past to understand our present-day struggles. However, at just over an hour, it does too much too quickly, and ultimately misses the mark.
Lessons on Revolution by Undone Theatre/Carmen Collective in The Pit, Barbican, 22 – 25 October 2025. Find out more here.
Words by Ellen Hodgetts
