England People Very Nice

Premiered at the UK's National Theatre, this presents a riotous journey through four waves of immigration from the 17th century to today

As the French Huguenots, the Irish, the Jews and the Bangladeshis in turn enter the chaotic world of Bethnal Green, each new influx provokes a surge of violent protest over housing, jobs, religion and culture

And the emerging pattern shows that white flight and anxiety over integration is anything but new

Written with scurrilous bravura, Richard Bean's great sweep of a comedy follows a pair of star-crossed lovers amid cutters' mobs, Papists, Jewish anarchists and radical Islamists across four tempestuous centuries