VISION STATEMENT
BY WRITER / PRODUCER CHRYSTAL ROSE
The story of United Kingdom Reparations is totally unique and relies on a great deal of historical and legal research with links to evidence to corroborate the facts. United Kingdom Reparations is structurally sound with great, complex, memorable characters, conflict and a warming resolution.
SYNOPSIS:
Zoe, Aron and heartthrob PHIL, who Za befriends at college, having the love of poetry in common, see Za, an intelligent, coconscious, caring, beautiful person, whilst others, including Phil’s parents, JACOB and EMILY, upper class snobs, only see her colour and insist on knowing where Za is “really” from. This prompts Za to want to find her birth parents.
From a chest in the attic, Phil shows Za photos of his deceased twin, STU, who he claims was younger and died of a Cardiac Arrest. Phil also divulges that he makes his own sweets.
Learning her natural father, EKON IGWE, is a Prince in Nigeria, Za longs to find him. Her adoptive parents and Phil dissuade her from doing so. She listens and shelves her plans.
Phil and Za get engaged, study law at Oxford and move to London. As a barrister, Za gains tenancy at VORST CHAMBERS, run by KC, DAVE VORST. Phil joins his family’s multi-billion-pound CULVE ESTATE AGENCY with branches and assets worldwide. From day one, Phil’s keen to be CEO.
Seeing a TV news story about bones of Black slaves from the West Indies being found on a Devon beach. makes Za want to explore her roots again. On Facebook, she learns Ekon lives in Nigeria. Secretly, she flies to meet him. Showing her a family tree, it’s steeped in slavery that haunts the family’s past. Za visits historical slavery sites and learns that reparations were paid to UK enslavers from a loan only repaid by UK tax payers in 2015. A Petition for Reparations to be debated in the House of Commons failed to get the needed 100k signatures.
Back in London, Za asks Dave for help to start a new Petition for reparations to pay Black descendants of slaves. He turns her down. Unknown to Za, his ancestors benefitted from the Trade. Phil learns his forefather, FRANCIS CULVE,enslaved Za’s forefather, JAMES DOZIE. Phil wants to keep this from Za, but Jacob and Emily want her to know hoping it will end their relationship. Jacob and Emily die in a car crash before they can tell Za. Jacob’s death certificate also details Cardiac Arrest.
Two weeks from their wedding, aborting an overnight stay with Ekon in a hotel and returning home, Za walks in on Phil having an affair. Za ends their relationship and recoups in Nigeria with Ekon.
Za finds out the link between hers and Phil’s forefathers, that Phil
is the younger twin and as such would not inherit the family fortune unless he was the last survivor. Finding evidence, Za believes Phil has caused his family’s deaths using poison in sweets. She takes her suspicions to the police.
Za’s reparations petition is a great success. She files a claim against Phil in unjust enrichment and shows in court how Phil has directly benefitted from her descendant being enslaved. Za wins the case. Phil is dishonoured and arrested for the murder of his brother and parents.
Za accepts that Rose had to give her up to avoid an impoverished life. After 29 years, Ekon reconnects with Rose’s parents and introduces Za to them. The Igwe family bond in love and unity.
TONE:
Using fictionalised characters based on actual historical events, United Kingdom Reparations will submerge and capture audiences with insights into the brutally and gruesome treatment endured by slaves captured from Nigeria, through the 1500s to 1800s, when slavery was eventually abolished, in a polished, palatable, memorable way to educate and entertain.
CHARACTER ARC:
Initially not wanting to ruffle the feathers of her adoptive parents and partner, Za Davies delays her desire to discover her heritage, but on learning her true African identity, she forges an unstoppable path which leads to a level of redemption for her forefathers and a path to reparations for people of African descendant living in the United Kingdom. Za evolves from a timid little girl into a figurehead of change.
