The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind - stage musical 🌍

William Kamkwamba's story has become well known over time, in diverse forms including

• TED talks
• a documentary short - Moving Windmills
• an international bestselling autobiography "The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind"
• a Netfix movie, (IMBD coverage)

and now it has been adapted into a musical by the RSC, which had a short initial run at the Swan Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon, before transferring to SohoPlace in London.

The basic story is that William was a boy in Malawi who gets thrown out of school because his family cannot pay the fees. However his interest in learning continues, and he manages to get some library access, and sees pictures of wind turbines. When famine arrives at his village, he designs and builds a windmill from scrap material (but also including his father's bike which is needed for the dynamo), which saves the village since it generates some electricity which enables the crops to be planted and irrigated in the dry season.

The RSC spent years producing the adaptation, including a field trip for the writers, director, and set designer out to William's village in Wimbe, Malawi to see the windmill still in place in the village. As a result, the windmill that is built on the stage as part of the show is impressive, and superficially looks quite like the original, albeit adapted for quick assembly during the show. It's a real shame therefore, especially given the educational aspect of the story, that the designers have not understood how the turbine works technically, and have produced a facsimile whose sails are shaped to cause the wind to turn them one way, but the motor they use to turn them in the show rotates them the wrong way.