Amanda Wilkin’s award-winning play returns to Soho Theatre: a transformative one-woman production about hope, healing and connection, Shedding a Skin is a story for our times.

“I would rather be anywhere. Anywhere else in the world right now. Than right here”. These are the first words spoken by Myah (Wilkin), a thirty-something year-old mixed-race woman in London, who, after an epic meltdown over a diversity and inclusion photoshoot at her workplace, has found herself unemployed and newly single…. again. Bouncing from job to job and wanting desperately to find herself, she eventually moves in with Jamaican pensioner Mildred. It is here that this joyful story of an intergenerational bond begins.

There are many laughs in the show with Wilkin’s crafty storytelling aided by Nina Dunn’s projected interludes on screen; these appear disjointed at first but make more sense as the story progresses, filling the screen with news of random acts of kindness. The script is well-written and reflexive, using light-hearted humour to tackle bleak topics like Brexit, immigration and microaggressions, as well as giving a voice to Myah’s ‘process’, as she fumbles through her lonely life. Rosanna Vize’s stage design is simple: white sheets hang on steel beams concealing rooms; and Wilkin performs seamlessly through them; and, it would seem, effortless also in alternating between the range of characters in her show: Myah, Mildred, Kemi and back to Myah again. As a performer, Wilkin certainly exemplifies the title of her show – her performance is formidable.

“Connection is an act of rebellion” is projected on the floor towards the end, reminding us that the show is about finding connection in the most unusual places, whether in a platonic friendship or past heroes who fought for civil rights in Britain. At the end, the play comes full circle: Myah affirms the here and now, in this moment, is where she’d rather be, and after experiencing the journey, the audience is likely to agree.