Review: Kim's Convenience (Oxford Playhouse)

Set in Regent’s Park, Toronto, the stage show of Kim’s Convenience (written by Ins Choi) premiered at Toronto Fringe in 2011 and has since been developed into a Netflix series. Currently on tour here in the UK, the narrative is based on Mr Kim, who immigrated to Canada from Korea and set up his own shop.

Walking into the auditorium of the Oxford Playhouse, the stage was set as this corner shop. The detail in the set design (by Mona Camille) was really pleasing as it felt like you were looking into a fully functioning shop, and there was a lot to take in before the show began.

Appa (James Yi) began the show on his own, a man clearly used to being in control of his beloved store and also those around him.  Instantly entertaining, yet at times flawed, Appa is a character who is easy to relate to. James Yi performs this role to great effect.

The show centres around the shop, and Appa himself for the majority of the time. His interactions with various customers (played, with great skill, by Andrew Gichigi) offered some good comedy moments towards the start of the show. Andrew Gichigi also played Alex, Janet’s crush from years previous, who appears in the shop and reconnects with the family.

Appa's interactions with his daughter Janet (Caroline Donica) portrayed a fairly standard parent/adult offspring relationship, with both having differing ideas of how the future will pan out but ultimately loving each other deeply. Appa trying to demonstrate how to run the shop to Janet was quite sad, as it was obvious she had ideas about what she wanted to do with her life, and they did not involve managing a shop. However his lesson in how to spot potential shoplifters was as amusing as it was absurd.

Appa’s wife, Umma (Candace Leung) has limited stage time but what there is of it is always significant, from a flashback with Appa, very well depicted using lighting (Jonathan Chan), to her reconnections with estranged son Jung (Daniel Phung) at church. The set was used effectively for the scenes in church with a moveable wall being introduced, complete with stained glass window. This separated the locations well. At times, Appa and Umma would speak to each other in Korean, which added authenticity to the portrayal of their relationship.  It was always clear what they were discussing by looking at their body language or gestures when this dialogue was taking place.

I feel Jung has less stage time than he perhaps should. There was no clarification of the details of why he is estranged from his dad, and no satisfying resolution of this situation, it is rather too neatly swept under the carpet for my taste, but perhaps this is to leave you thinking once the show has finished.

Appa left a teaching career in Korea to immigrate to Canada, and has since worked tirelessly in his convenience store hoping to hand it on to his children, but will Janet and Jung take on this responsibility, or will Appa sell the shop to developers?  You’ll have to watch the show to find out.

A show that stands at 75 minutes, with no interval, and is performed beautifully by the entire cast, it’s a pleasant watch, and I can see why it has been developed into a TV series.

⭐⭐⭐

Kim’s Convenience is showing at Oxford Playhouse until Saturday 17th May. The UK tour then continues.

I was gifted a ticket for this show in exchange for an honest review.