The Dumb Waiter + A Slight Ache, Greenwich Theatre, Until June 3, 2023
On the face of it, The Dumb Waiter is a play about a pair of hapless, ground down hitmen awaiting their next job in a dingy basement in Birmingham.
This has little to do with the subject of A Slight Ache, which follows the musings of a couple whose relationship becomes increasingly pressured by the presence of a mysterious match-seller.
But Harold Pinter’s tragi-comic short plays sit surprisingly well together on stage at Greenwich Theatre, especially when – pause for dramatic effect – presented by an overlapping cast.
Despite a cast of only three actors and a spare, minimal set, the production is a sharp, lean sliver of a thing, twisting and turning as the characters wrestle with their precarious situations.
The performances that director James Haddrell has coaxed from his cast are exactly right for the material.
Tony Mooney and Kerrie Taylor in A Slight Ache -image Danny Kaan
Jude Akuwudike, Kerrie Taylor and Tony Mooney each breathe rich, believable life into the five characters we meet across the two plays, in a way that effortlessly lets the audience focus on the ideas and topics teased and hinted at.
These are skilled professionals laying bare the strangeness of Pinter’s plots, making them whole with flesh and blood people.
A Slight Ache, has Edward (Akuwudike) and Flora (Taylor) incarcerated in the claustrophobic existence of their brittle relationship.
Much remains unsaid. Instead, the horror is all in the detail – the brutal execution of a wasp trapped in marmalade using boiling water is juxtaposed with cheerful chit chat about the various plants in the garden.
But what are we to make of the mysterious figure of a match seller just outside their tranquil oasis?
A brooding, constant presence that Edward is both terrified of and obsessed by.
Made flesh by a completely impassive Mooney, this figure is the impervious rock against which main characters pound themselves to wreckage – a study of buried truths, fantasy, repression, fear and desire – both sexual and maternal.
While all three are powerful – notably Mooney’s ability to convey a completely leaden, static presence – it’s Akuwudike who shines.
With much of the play in monologue, his depiction of Edward finds layers in a proper man confronted with the unknown – a breakdown inevitable as he wears himself down against the granite face of the totally unresponsive match seller.
Mooney, left, and Akuwudike in The Dumb Waiter – image Danny Kaan
The switch to The Dumb Waiter comes as something of a shock as Akuwudike is transformed from arch middle class essayist to a working class football fan and hitman.
Along with Ben (a much more active Mooney) the pair are found in a claustrophobic basement bedsit as they grapple with boredom and the expectation of the next job.
While Pinter’s twist is over-telegraphed, the pressure-cooker atmosphere acts as an ideal counterpoint to A Slight Ache.
Here the unknown isn’t a character, but a series of mysterious messages via envelope under the door and what appear to be kitchen orders from an unseen and possibly defunct cafe above.
More dynamic than the first play, it casts its two characters as treading a fine line between the rational and irrational as they attempt to make sense of their lives, the dreadful murders they commit and the significance of why their boss hasn’t laid on any gas to make the tea.
This play too is a tense portrait of two people struggling and, along with its companion, makes for a refreshing, thought-provoking night out at the theatre.
- Jon Massey is co-founder and editorial director of Wharf Life and writes about a wide range of subjects in Canary Wharf, Docklands and east London - contact via jon.massey@wharf-life.com
We wanted a name that represented bravery, humility and honesty,” said David Caetano, co-founder of Baldr CrossFit in Deptford’s Childers Street.
“It’s named after the Norse god Baldr because I lived in Norway for about four years and my mum is still there.
“Everything Baldr does is good, but he doesn’t brag about it, so it’s representative of what we’re trying to create here.”
The virtuous son of chief deities Odin and Frigg, is a firm favourite in Asgard in contrast to the deceptive Loki and bombastic Thor, often because of his calm sweetness – not perhaps the most obvious allegory for the sweat and grind of a south-east London CrossFit gym.
But Baldr’s whole reason for existence is to do things differently.
“Above all, this is an inclusive space,” said David, who founded the gym with his partner Ben Wilson, opening the doors earlier this year.
The Deptford gym has a wealth of of equipment for members to use
“People come in, see the Progress Pride Flag hanging in the window and feel comfortable. This is a place for everyone.
“I came to London from Portugal at a time where there was still stigma around being part of the LGBTQIA+ community. Here, there was anything and everything.
“I became comfortable with my sexuality about three years ago but what I’d noticed was that, when you go to gyms, there wasn’t always representation there. Some do have it and, as soon as I’d walk in, I’d feel safe.
“At Baldr, because we’re LGBTQIA+ we’re more outspoken about this and so people are happier being themselves, speaking about their partners and things like that.
“I really felt there was a need to create something within fitness to change the conversation so we’re not talking in terms of men and women, but about individuals.
“The way we do that is to get away from CrossFit’s weights for men and women and just talk about percentages when we come to the bars and levels of resistance.”
Baldr is located around 10 minutes’ walk from both Deptford and New Cross stations and offers a range of classes for up to 10 people.
Alongside its core CrossFit offering these include weightlifting, gymnastics and Capacity, a barbell-free class designed to improve an individual’s ability to recover from high intensity exercise.
Monthly memberships start at £159 for three classes a week. There are also drop-in packages starting at £20 for a single class as well as small group and one-to-one personal training.
Baldr also offers free trial sessions to new clients so they can get a feel for what the gym offers.
“CrossFit is all about functional movement,” said David.
“Every time you squat, you’re sitting on a couch. The idea is that everything you do in the gym can be transferred to the world outside.
“What we’re trying to do with our programmes is to hit those functional movements so that when you’re 80, you can get off a chair without having to roll over or needing someone to help you.
“We constantly vary the sessions across seven areas of exercise so people will never get bored. The idea is an all-round one so members can say they can lift weights, run a mile and do a certain number of pull-ups.
“We keep the group training small, so we have 10 max in a group, and this makes sure that everyone gets attention in the session, and they get a little bit of personal training in a group setting too.”
The gym is located in Deptford’s Childers Street
With Ben, who works for Deutsche Bank looking after the business side of operations, it’s an offering squarely within David’s area of expertise.
“I was always into fitness and wanted to be good at everything,” said David.
“I originally came to London to study architecture, but sitting in front of a computer all day wasn’t really what I was looking for.
“I started doing CrossFit and then decided to train as a coach – that was about seven years ago.
“After working at my first gym and helping to run it for a few years, I joined Third Space in 2019, working in Canary Wharf.
“The CrossFit gym taught me a lot about running a small fitness business, while working at Third Space enabled me to look at the bigger picture – the language we use in classes and the impact this can have on members.
“I was also able to take a lead and get involved with developing new coaches and instructors, so that experience was really key for this project.
“Ben’s background is in business, finance and accounting, so he handles that side of things whereas I’m on the product side, looking after coaching, development and what we deliver for our members.
“This is perfect because it means we don’t cross over when we’re working together.
“We live close by and were aware there was nothing like this in Deptford, so we started looking to see if there was a space up for rent.
“Then Ben put together a business plan, looking at the area and why Baldr might be needed here – asking what the brand is and what its target audience will be.”
The pair found a space vacated by a fashion manufacturer and set about kitting it out with gym hardware, gender neutral toilets and, of course, the big pride flag.
The gym has been conceived as a safe space where all are welcome
The dream for Baldr is to expand with gyms in a number of parts of London and perhaps beyond.
David said: “We would like to have several locations so that we can attract people living in different areas.
“We are aware gyms can be quite intimidating, especially for people not always comfortable with their sexuality, so we like to chat with them and point out it’s their space, their workout and that we’re here to support them.
“We want to make sure that everyone has a good experience in the community and make sure they get that one-to-one experience in a group setting.
“We are loud and proud, so if you need a space like ours, then we are here for you.”
- Jon Massey is co-founder and editorial director of Wharf Life and writes about a wide range of subjects in Canary Wharf, Docklands and east London - contact via jon.massey@wharf-life.com
Having dropped out of university, bored by his business course and keen to avoid getting into debt, the entrepreneur tried his hand in various sectors.
Following stints in estate agency, stockbroking and helming a failed website business, fitness beckoned.
“I fell into personal training,” he said. “I was always sporty – basketball, football and athletics at school and basketball for my county, Essex.
“But then you get into standard living, so it was nice to get back into fitness.
“What I learnt from the website business was that I wanted to gain some experience for a few years and earn my stripes before launching something.
“So I worked for Virgin Active in Moorgate, spent all my spare time studying, did my personal training qualifications in 2013 and that was it.”
From those beginnings, Matt started hosting outdoor fitness sessions in east London parks before successfully crowdfunding and opening his first physical gym in Old Street in 2016.
“I took my personal training clients, went freelance and that’s how things evolved,” he said. “Walking through those doors on opening day was beautiful, but also so stressful.
“We had plumbing problems – the changing rooms leaked into the gym floor and when we first opened I was there for several nights in a row lifting floorboards with water gushing out.
Outrivals founder Matt Lo
“I didn’t know what to do, but that’s part of the game – the unexpected stuff, the random scenarios. If you don’t want those challenges, then you shouldn’t run a business.”
With the leaks stopped, his first gym performed solidly up until the pandemic when, like many businesses, its model was upset by unprecedented circumstances.
When the Old Street gym closed permanently in 2021, buffeted by lockdowns and home working, the next chapter in Matt’s story was already unfolding.
“I first saw the space on Greenwich Peninsula about five years ago – but we couldn’t get funding for it back then,” he said.
“So I reached out to developer Knight Dragon as it was still empty and they said they were looking for an operator.
“We came in and opened in 2021 – I feel we’ve created something really solid for the community here.”
That something is Outrivals – a health and fitness space located on the Thames with its entrance facing elevated public space The Tide.
“When the agent showed me the unit in 2018 it looked really promising – especially with everything the developer was doing to create a community, building it up from scratch,” said Matt.
“I wanted to be a part of that. Outrivals has been set up as a place where people can come together to make friends and connections through fitness.
“Essentially, it’s a community-based gym.
The gym offers a range of membership options
“We offer small group classes and personal training with a team of people who are all specialised in their fields.
“It’s down to them that we have got where we are today.
“We’ve tested many different classes – sussing out exactly what people like.
“We wanted it to be a very strong facility, where people come knowing that they’re getting excellent training from very good staff, but having fun at the same time.
“We do strong-man and strong-woman classes where people lift 50k balls – stuff you wouldn’t be able to do at home on your own.
“We do an hour and a half endurance class and we have a leg-day on Monday.
“So we’ve worked on what we want to be about, but at the same time made these things fun for the people who are doing them.”
Memberships at Outrivals start at £30 per month for gym-only access – available for anyone who works, studies or lives in Greenwich.
Standard open gym memberships are £55. Small Group Training memberships start at £60 per month for four classes with eight session and unlimited options also available.
One-to-one personal training packages start at £99 per month with three hour-long sessions included.
“We also offer dedicated packages such as our 12-week strength, weight loss or post-natal programmes,” said Matt, who also runs Choy House, an Asian street food restaurant now based at Design District’s food hall Canteen, a little further south on the peninsula.
“We feel we’re on a really good journey here at this gym.
“When I first came here, there weren’t many buildings – the community was very new. Since then lots of people have moved in and lots has been built.
Outrivals overlooks The Tide park and the Thames
“To help boost that we create events, summer socials and charity challenges that help bring people together, not just in the gym but outside it as well.
“Personally, I understand the importance of fitness although I admit I’m hit and miss with how much I train.
“When I miss a session, though, I really feel it both mentally and physically, so I know what an effect it can have.
“Ultimately I’d like to grow the brand, launching in other new developments so we can widen out the community and bring even more people together – whether that’s in London, other cities or even internationally.”
Outrivals has a number of offers for those considering taking out a membership.
Prospective clients can try out the gym’s facilities for three consecutive days, including open access to training spaces and small group classes.
Members can also get up to £50 cashback for referring new clients who then take out a membership.
On the personal training front, in addition to packages for individuals, Outrivals offers sessions for couples or people who simply want to train together.
A £150 per month fee covers two sessions for two people with an Outrivals coach. Packages covering more sessions are also available.
For individuals who need more flexibility, the gym also offers blocks of personal training that can be used over a two-month period instead of the usual one-month expiry date.
- Jon Massey is co-founder and editorial director of Wharf Life and writes about a wide range of subjects in Canary Wharf, Docklands and east London - contact via jon.massey@wharf-life.com
A niche is what every entrepreneur needs for their business to be a success and that’s what Karyna Sukha spotted while working in the fashion industry.
Originally from Ukraine, she came to the UK to study some 13 years ago.
“I did my degree at the London College Of Communication in graphic design and illustration, but I always wanted to work in fashion,” she said.
“My parents thought I should study architecture or interior design, so graphic design was somewhere in between.
“It’s something that gives you a wide range of skills.
“After university I started working for fashion companies such as Tata Naka, House of Holland, Alexander McQueen and Tateossian.
“I was mostly doing graphic design including print, textiles, photography, editing and that journey eventually led me to become a studio production manager
“That involved a lot of work with manufacturers to develop the collections and that’s when I first thought about starting my own company.”
Fabrika is based at Design District on Greenwich Peninsula
The challenge for Karyna and the designers was the traditional approach of the makers when faced with fresh ideas.
“At that time, communication was difficult and it was causing problems with both design and manufacturing,” she said.
“So I thought it would be great to set up a company that would understand the new generation of designers.
“I was a young graphic designer at the time – I had so many friends who were finishing their degrees in fashion and needed someone they could relate to and have their designs produced by.
“I bought a machine, started making garments for them and that was the start of Fabrika.
“After about three months we got our first client – a bigger brand – and we’ve now been working together for more than six years.”
Originally operating from North London, the business – which produces garments for Richard Quinn, Phoebe English and Matty Bovan as well as smaller labels and startups – recently moved to Design District on Greenwich Peninsula.
The business has grown to a team of 13 with further expansion planned
Occupying a lofty triple height space in one of 6A Architects’ steel, glass and marble cheesegrater-like buildings, Fabrika today is a team of 13, having grown its pool of skilled machinists to meet demand.
“We specialise in working with small designers producing anything from one to 300 pieces depending on their needs,” said Karyna.
“They might come to us with a drawing or a pre-made sample and we will then help them develop the design, produce a paper pattern and then continue to make reproductions for however many items they need.
“Our current turnover per month is 600 garments and we’ve moved to Greenwich to expand – we want to push things a bit further this year.
“I’ve developed with the company – I was in my early 20s when I started and I’m 30 now.
“It’s been a long journey to get where we are now.
“The more clients we got, the more people started talking about what we were doing because of the quality we were able to achieve.
“We expanded with machinists and some freelancers working from home.
“About two years ago I employed a studio manager and that really helped because before that I was doing everything myself.
“There have been ups, downs and lots of nice times over the past few years.
“But it’s always interesting to grow and develop, to try new things and to meet new people. Every challenge is a good challenge.
“There is definitely a demand for garments made locally and sustainably.
Karyna created Vavi Studio as a creative outlet for her own fashion ideas
“We’ve always tried to build strong relationships with the clients we work with – we love when they come down to see how their garments are made.
“Moving to Design District was about growth, but also about breaking the stereotype that manufacturing takes place in large spaces with no natural light.
“Here we have a beautiful space that is comfortable for our workers.
“We are trying to be as open as possible to show that manufacturing is not something scary that happens in the background but something people can see.
With the core business on a stable footing, Karyna has turned her attention to a fresh, albeit complementary venture, in recent years.
“I got a scholarship to study for a masters degree in international fashion business at Polimoda in Florence, which led me into thinking about what other ways there might be to develop Fabrika,” she said.
“We’d got to the point where everything was working without me having to be in direct control – I didn’t have to worry 24 hours a day anymore.
“So I stepped back a bit and tried to decide what other options there might be.
“I’ve always been creative and I wanted to put a little bit of creativity back into my business.”
The result of that thought process is Vavi Studio – her own label, named for her younger sister.
It’s a creative outlet for Karyna’s own designs, which are then made to order by Fabrika in Greenwich.
“I wanted to develop clothes for the everyday, busy woman,” said Karyna.
“The collections are based on interchangeable garments, which can be mixed and matched and are appropriate both for a working environment and then going out in the evening.
“Each piece is made to order so there is no waste.
“I think sustainability is increasingly important – especially manufacturing in London where a lot of people expect this in the production of the garments they buy.
“We are making clothes locally rather than overseas, so that cuts down on transport emissions and a lot of our clients also try to source fabrics in this country.
“Many ask for the offcuts too so they can recycle them.
“Right now, the plan is to expand, to grow the team and to start working with bigger brands to bring more production back to the UK.
“It does cost more but it’s good for the environment and for people to have longer lasting garments rather than ones they just wear once or a few times and quickly wear out.
“I hope that people will be thinking about these things in a more environmentally positive way in future especially as the industry has not been so good in the past.
“A lot of people are talking about it and brands should too.
“We do our best, but a lot depends on the designers too.
“Many are now interested in using recycled materials and that’s great.
“We also recently worked with a designer who was using silk that was produced without the silkworms being harmed – normally they die in the process.
“I think there should be more educational content produced so people know how things are made to enable them to be more responsible as consumers.”
- Jon Massey is co-founder and editorial director of Wharf Life and writes about a wide range of subjects in Canary Wharf, Docklands and east London - contact via jon.massey@wharf-life.com
“I’ve been writing since I could first hold a pencil and dabbled in various things when I was a teenager in school,” said the artist, currently based at Art Hub Studios in Creekside, Deptford.
A career as an advertising creative and then manager of agencies saw her work first in her native Canada, then North America, Europe and India.
“I’d done what I set out to do – to work internationally in a multi-country environment and I was successful,” she said.
“I wanted to go back to my creative roots – that was 10 years ago – and so I got myself a little studio in Deptford and started to take pictures.
“I also had a lot of photographs from my travels – but I didn’t want to be a straight photographer.”
Instead, Alice taught herself to paint her photographs digitally with the aim of creating something new.
The body of work she has created is varied and extensive, with images that are colourful, monochrome, three dimensional, two dimensional, photographic and almost entirely abstract.
Red from Alice’s Love On The Rocks series
“I never change the composition of the original photograph – it is what it is, it’s like a canvas,” she said.
“When choosing the ones to paint, I have a vision in my head – sometimes I achieve that and sometimes I can’t.
“Sometimes I can do it in several different ways – it’s always possible to repaint images.
“Each time I create an image, it goes back to being a writer, because I’m telling a story. There’s no absolute point where they’re finished.
“I just have to ask whether I’m satisfied with it and whether it says what I want it to say.”
The word, perhaps, for Alice’s creativity is “instinctive”. She looks at a photograph or a collection of objects and imagines what they could become.
“I have a series called Love On The Rocks,” she said.
“I took the images in Iceland – it was cold and raining while I was taking photos and my husband said he was going for a walk.
“There was a volcanic hill behind us and I took pictures of him as he walked along the ridge. He couldn’t see it, but I could see the outline of a woman in the shape of the hill.
“For another series, I’d always wanted to do something with layered hills.
“In Portugal I got to a summit and just saw this amazing vista in front of me.
Eastern Hunt from Alice’s series The King’s Lodging
“So I started snapping away and, after I’d painted them digitally, I realised there was a romantic story in there, so I called the series The King’s Lodging.
“Each piece within it has its own title and the idea was to tell a story by displaying them together so the viewer could create the narrative in their head.”
Alice’s latest project has been to create a second digital book of her work, based on the Chinese Zodiac.
“I have a friend – John Vollmer – who is an Asian scholar,” she said.
“He sent me a picture of a snake from some archive in celebration of the year of the snake and I thought we could do a better job.
“We started collaborating for the year of the horse – I painted a photograph of the animal and he wrote the text. I wrote a story to go with it and once I’d done that I knew I wanted to do all 12 animals.
“Then John told me about five, which is an important number in Chinese philosophy. That led me to create Five: Wuxing Elements In Art And Words with a foreword by him.”
Alice’s latest digital book features 81 artworks, about 25% of which were made specifically for the project.
Rebirth from Alice’s series The King’s Lodging
“While there are no stories in the book, I have written a poem for each of the elements. I want readers to really respond to the art in Five.
“I love landscapes and seascapes and ‘seeing’ is important to me. I want people to see things in a different way – familiar, but unfamiliar.
“It’s fantastic to have people look at and talk about your work because they see things in it that you don’t.
“For example, I made a piece from a photograph of the tailpiece of a stringed instrument and people saw a boat in the final work.”
While the majority of Alice’s work is created digitally, she also creates sculptures, including recent pieces using found objects.
Nightlife In Blue
“I don’t like sitting at a computer all day long, but my paintings don’t get made if I don’t do some of that,” she said.
“I’ve always loved working with my hands and I have an idea that I will also make collages from my finished digital paintings.
“With the wall hangings, I had some different kinds of rope and just started to play.
“The fairy stones – ones you find that have natural holes – are from the Mediterranean and Ramsgate.
“I’d had them for years, having collected them, and I thought I’d do something with them that has different textures.
“I’m fascinated by texture in all my work. I try to make a big thing of that in my paintings because we live in a world that’s anything but flat.
“First, it’s about the photography. I have to go out and take the image. If I didn’t do that, you wouldn’t have the picture.
“Then the paintings sit within a range – a set of dimensions.
“That means I can achieve results that are more photographic while others are more in the middle or much more abstract.
“I often strive for the sweet spot between those two things that combines them both, but sometimes the painting won’t let me go there.
“They take varying amounts of time – it really depends on the picture and on me.
“I have a painting from India that took me 10 years because I kept going back to it.
“It wasn’t saying to me what I wanted it to say, so I put it away and would bring it out every couple of years and try again until it was finally complete.”
- Jon Massey is co-founder and editorial director of Wharf Life and writes about a wide range of subjects in Canary Wharf, Docklands and east London - contact via jon.massey@wharf-life.com
If you think this article is going to explain exactly what will fill the Art In Perpetuity Trust Gallery from February 16 to March 5, you’re in for a disappointment.
But sit with Space Lab co-curator and artist Nicola Rae for a chat about the exhibition and you can’t help but feel a little awed by its ambition.
These await various pieces of equipment that will focus on a series of fluid vortices, part of an investigation into gravity, water and acoustic waves.
Magnets will spin, stirring liquids in tubular glass vases, while a camera is used to capture something called schlieren distortions.
Quite how it will all come together is still a work in progress.
This is just one of seven co-creative experiments conceived for Space Lab by Nicola and co-curator Ulrike Kuchner, an artist, astrophysicist and creative producer.
“We have spent more than a year on this show,” said Nicola.
“We put in an application for grant funding to the Science And Technology Facilities Council and were amazed that we got everything we asked for.
“In a way we shouldn’t have been surprised, because Space Lab is an incredibly exciting project.
“Ulrike, as a post-doc researcher at Nottingham, has a lot of connections and she feels strongly that often collaborations are not as in-depth as they could be, focusing instead on public engagement or the dissemination of research by scientists.
“So we set off with the idea of going deeper. We also wanted the artists and scientists to have a really big space for the work they create.
“We call Space Lab an expanded field of experiments – it is the idea of going beyond limits, outside the remit of scientific experimentation.
“Everyone involved is very interested in process. I haven’t seen all the finished work yet, including my own, but we have set really ambitious targets.
“Some of it will work and some of it won’t. Some will change in curation from how it appears in the studio when it’s placed in the gallery.
“We want all those elements to be free flowing, allowing things to happen.”
While the experiments are too complex to list comprehensively here, one to watch out for is bio-designer Anshuman Gupta’s BioBorgs – biocomputers that imagine a reality where organisms can act autonomously, based on environmental threats.
These respond to the research of collaborator and exoplanetary astronomer, Amaury Triaud, into the Trappist-1 system.
Its planets are most optimal for evidence of life beyond our solar system.
“We wanted to set this ambition that the artists would contribute meaningfully to the science,” said Nicola, who has been based at APT’s studios since 1995 and has taught at the Univeristy Of The Arts London since 2006.
“My work will be a series of experiments working with liquid vortices and I’m making the scientific equipment myself.
Nicola will be creating liquid vorticies as part of her collaborative experiment
“I’ll be working with quinine and coconut oil in the water to create different densities.
“There will also be magnifying glasses and different equipment on tripods and there will probably be a performative element as well.
“At the heart of it, we’re trying to communicate a fascination with phenomena and the scientific process – something that’s so often seen in labs but less so outside them.”
Aside from the seven collaborative experiments, there’s another strand to Space Lab.
As part of the process of putting the exhibition together, the curators have been working with Tech Yard creative technologist Jazmin Morris to create a series of workshops for young people.
Titled Space Labs: Stars In Your Eyes, these have seen astrophysicists going into Lewisham schools to explore the themes of the exhibition and have a go at creating their own pieces.
“The big surprise for us was how enthusiastic the children were, particularly when talking about science questions, and there’d be a big sea of hands going up, asking really good questions,” said Nicola.
“We thought there might be a lack of interest, but not at all.
“We will be featuring some of the students’ work on screen at the exhibition and we’ll be inviting their families and friends to see that on the last weekend of the show.
“I hope anyone who comes down to see Space Lab feels really intrigued and excited.
“Astrophysics is seen as quite elitist but this is all about reaching out to people who might feel they could go into this field.
“With new telescopes generating a huge amount of data, this is really an expanding area.
“It’s not just about the children, but also changing the minds of parents.
“This is something that’s come up in research again and again – kids listen to their parents and it’s really sad that children who are good at maths are told they shouldn’t go into these areas.
“When you go into these astrophysics departments, you see how varied an environment it is – people from different countries around the world – and that’s very exciting to see.
“Although we’re artists and creative technologists, one of the lovely things that comes up in the feedback we’ve had is how many of the children participating in the workshops are now considering science as a career.”
Space Lab is set to go on show from February 16 to March 5 at APT Gallery in Creekside.
- Jon Massey is co-founder and editorial director of Wharf Life and writes about a wide range of subjects in Canary Wharf, Docklands and east London - contact via jon.massey@wharf-life.com
Declarations that it is “The most wonderful time of the year” are being blasted at us from all angles.
That perfectly trimmed TV turkey, the handmade centrepiece online, families decorating in matching Christmas jumpers.
Fomo is more rampant than ever, but with the shadow of Covid just over our shoulders and the cost of living crisis in our faces, do we really need to embrace it?
Phil Willmott from Rotherhithe Playhouse knows no-one wants to be Scrooge, but thinks it’s important to highlight that we don’t have to be Stacey Solomon either.
The theatre, which launched in summer 2020, is marking its second festive season with The Christmas Wife – a dark comedy offering couples the chance to pause and reflect.
Showing from December 15-30 at the theatre’s new home in The Hithe, it is an adaptation of Ibsen’s The Doll’s House, which tells the story of a wife whose perfect Christmas starts to unravel due to one bad decision.
It will be tempered against family favourite The Wizard Of Oz, also showing December 15-30, 2022, which launches a new scheme offering up to four free childrens’ tickets with a paying adult.
I sat down with Phil to find out more about the plays and the theatre’s plans for 2023.
The Christmas Wife is set to play at Rotherhithe Playhouse
why this play for Christmas?
We’re all about getting people to go to the theatre who haven’t been much.
There’s a great tradition in this country of doing theatre for families and children at Christmas and I wondered if it might be possible to present slightly intelligent plays that could be a Christmas night out for adults.
I looked for something that would be thrilling and entertaining and The Doll’s House is one everyone has heard of, but not many people have seen.
why rename it?
The original is set during Christmas and I have upped the ante slightly on the angle of providing the perfect Christmas and how the pressure makes the wife start to buckle.
Often men don’t take responsibility for the perfect Christmas, they just expect it to be there and don’t see the hard work.
I had seen The Doll’s House and liked it, but when I read it again, I realised there was so much more to it.
It’s extraordinary how this was written about a Victorian couple but we could so easily be eavesdropping on any modern house.
There are the same kind of money worries, the same stresses and strains that come about when a family is thrown together so intensely in the festive period.
what’s the aim?
It shows that the struggle to get through Christmas is a sort of universal thing. It pulls on your heartstrings and that’s nothing to be ashamed of.
Perhaps if we opened up the discussion a bit more there wouldn’t be the pressure to recreate the mystique of the perfect family Christmas with an elaborate dinner and a beautifully decorated house.
If it was more collaborative, there would be a shared responsibility for it.
what happens in the play?
The character is the perfect housewife, during the perfect Christmas. She’s got the perfect husband – he’s just been promoted – and perfect children.
They are having a party and the house looks gorgeous, but to pay for it, she gets the equivalent of a payday loan.
She didn’t quite make the payments back and due to a series of coincidences, the guy who organised the loan ends up at their house.
She becomes terrified her husband will find out and about the repercussions. Will he stand by her and be sympathetic?
We see what she decides to do and what that says about their marriage.
is that a common scenario today?
I did some research and the main reason people divorce is money.
The main time the cracks begin to show is at Christmas.
So there’s a sort of double whammy of creating this amazing time, not spending too much, but also not being a Scrooge.
is it more stressful this year?
Yes. We are in the middle of an economic downturn and there is still the pressure to create the perfect Christmas.
You’re also worried about whether you’ve had the heating on too long.
My elderly parents are certainly thinking twice about it.
The pressure has doubled down and you find yourself thinking: ‘What if it isn’t a great Christmas?‘ or ‘What’s wrong with me?
Why aren’t I happy like the rest of the world?’. In fact, the rest of the world is thinking the same.
The festive season is very strange like that. Coming in, you should be happy and making a fresh start. Also, 10 years ago who knew we all had a credit rating?
Suddenly it’s something you have to worry about. We are confined by something that’s almost entirely artificial and has been sort of forced on us.
what are you like at Christmas?
I’m a gay man in a relationship, so we don’t really have those same pressures, and we’ve often just taken ourselves off for a nice weekend or something.
But I remember seeing it in my parents when I was growing up and looking back, I see things I didn’t understand as a kid.
My grandma had quite severe, MS and my granddad was her main carer, but somehow on Christmas Day, he produced dinner for 12. That must have created a great amount of stress.
As kids we took it for granted.
what causes the stress?
Everyone wants their children to have the most magical Christmas.
Then there’s the pressure for the extended family to come together and siblings might not get on, but because its Christmas, you have to.
Very few people are motivated by just pleasing themselves at Christmas.
how has the Playhouse evolved?
After last Christmas, we took a break to think about how to do things better.
We used to set up a theatre in a different venue for each production, but decided it would be good to have a home, so people know where we are.
This is the second production in our new home at The Hithe. It’s a hub for startup businesses and we’ve got one of the biggest studios upstairs.
We wouldn’t normally be able to afford it, but I approached them and made the case – because the owners are tuned into our philosophy of lifelong learning and trying to keep theatre alive, they have let us have it for just under market rent.
Rotherhithe Playhouse’s home at The Hithe
why did you want a home?
We used to move around because, as Covid lost its grip, there were lots of institutions and buildings, which needed to show the public they had opened again – a play was a good way of getting people through the doors.
That’s become less useful now and it’s more useful for the community to know there’s a place where every school holiday, there’ll be something for kids for free.
If people choose, they can come back and see some of the greatest plays ever written with tickets you can afford.
does the future feel more secure?
I think so. We’re very reliant on people’s goodwill and it’s taken a little while to build that up. We had a good momentum but then disappeared for six months so we need to build up the audience members again.
This project is not entirely make-or-break, but if we can’t turn the corner with a production of The Wizard of Oz, then we are doing something wrong.
We’ll sit down at the end of this and look very carefully at the box office figures and hopefully, the books will tell us people are enjoying coming and we should continue.
I suspect we will carry on. There’s enough interest in the project that we can keep building it. The ultimate goal is to get everyone paid properly and make it sustainable.
is The Christmas Wife a gamble?
Yes. Will people exhausted from work want to see it? I don’t know. The other reason I decided on The Wizard of Oz is that’s such a well-known title and hopefully, the 50 seats will fill themselves.
It will be an added bonus if people come back for the drama, which will have 30 seats.
is it still a minimalist set?
Yes. I don’t want to do those great, long lumbering, stodgy productions with bits of scenery cranking about.
At its heart, this is about an audience sat around in a semicircle, with very good actors telling a story very clearly and carrying people along with it.
is it hard to find actors these days?
The arts are still decimated after Covid, so many people have left the profession because there was no work and a lot of them have stayed in permanent jobs.
There’s a shortage of actors who want to give up long-term stable employment to take a short-term contract.
We try to keep rehearsals and performances outside of office hours so it’s possible to maintain your survival job and also practice your craft.
do you still have a day job?
Yes, I’m still also a professional journalist, but this has become more my main job, although it doesn’t pay like it.
It wouldn’t operate without a high level of focus on my part.
I’d like to delegate more, but you need a certain calibre of person that you are happy to leave things to.
We are so open to anyone getting involved. Even if you don’t have any experience and would like to volunteer, we will teach you.
plans for 2023?
It is quite dependent on how people react to these plays.
The only thing I’m absolutely sure of is that every holiday and half-term I want to do a piece of kids theatre where the tickets are free for kids so that they don’t just go to the theatre a couple of times during their childhood.
I want it to be something they can do regularly so that it demystifies the process and it makes it feel natural and comfortable.
Before we begin our walk across the 53 acres that British Land (BL) is regenerating on Rotherhithe peninsula, Roger Madelin indulges in a raspberry croissant at Canada Water Cafe (only £2.70 for those who fancy a treat).
The place is packed. Local residents are meeting, chatting and working at tables. It’s the kind of image developers like to mock up on computers to show the thriving neighbourhoods their schemes will hopefully create.
It’s also cause for Roger to reflect on the fact that BL has a very rare opportunity at Canada Water – a project it describes as a chance to “build London’s first new town centre in 50 years” at the heart of a mature, expectant community.
Carpeted with mostly suburban housing in the first flush of Docklands regeneration, the area is already home to residents, increasingly attracted by its close proximity to both the central London and Canary Wharf, thanks to the Jubilee line, but also to east and south London via the Overground.
Roger tells me it’s within 45 minutes of more places in the capital than anywhere else.
As joint head of Canada Water at BL, there’s a glint in his eye as he talks about the firm’s ambitions for the area.
Having spent 29 years at developer Argent overseeing the projects across the country such as Brindleyplace in Birmingham and the rebirth of King’s Cross in north London, there’s a sense that he couldn’t quite resist this one.
“BL noticed I was leaving Argent and asked if I wanted to come and run Canada Water,” he said.
“At first I was sceptical, I didn’t want to do a residential development, which is what I thought it would be.
“But then I came down here and realised it would be an opportunity to build a new town centre – what an extraordinary privilege.
“Then you get to ask what that is and I think it’s about health, environment and sustainability.
“Everyone in the world should regard urban places as very important and I think both Canada Water and Canary Wharf can be exemplars for how to reposition areas as urban centres.”
British Land’s joint head of Canada Water, Roger Madelin
While Canary Wharf continues its transition from pure business district to a place that’s home to companies, residential housing and a potent blend of leisure and hospitality attractions, Canada Water is still in the first chapter of its journey.
Concrete cores are rising on the first of its new buildings, which will include a new leisure centre for the area and social housing on the site’s eastern periphery.
But these first structures are very much the vanguard in what will be a transformation of a plot that includes the whole of Surrey Quays Shopping Centre, the old Harmsworth Quay Printworks and connects Southwark Park with Greenland Dock and Russia Dock Woodland.
“With the planning permission we have, we can create a new urban centre,” said Roger.
“We have the ability to flex from 3million sq ft of commercial space to 4million – likewise we can build a minimum of 2,000 homes or a maximum of just under 4,000.
“Similarly, we can build up to 1million sq ft of retail and leisure space – we may not do that, but it will be a substantial amount. With the current shopping centre and leisure park, the area has about 350,000sq ft.
“As an overview, we’ll have about 35 new buildings, 20 acres of new public space and a 3.5-acre park.
“Many of our buildings will be five storeys high to protect the view of St Paul’s from Greenwich, so this will be on a human scale and I think that will attract people.
“The development I was involved with at King’s Cross has more people going there at weekends than to work during the week.
“There are dozens of places around London that are teeming with people on Saturday and Sunday.
“It’s great for people that live in them, but we also want people living outside to come here and enjoy themselves.”
British Land intends to preserve The Printworks building as a cultural venue
That attitude has doubtless been bolstered by the success of event and music venue Printworks, which has seen Harmsworth Quays’ immense press halls regularly fill with revellers enjoying some of the very best electronic music in London.
While originally conceived as a temporary use for the vast building in partnership with Broadwick Live, the plan is now to preserve the venue as part of the overall scheme, enclosing and enlarging the existing building and creating a park next to it.
“I credit my wife entirely for the decision to explore retaining the whole building,” said Roger.
“She and I walked round here in the summer of 2015 and she immediately saw the amazing opportunity it presented and asked what we were going to do with it.
“I said the assumption was that we would knock it down because it looked a bit harsh but she said we shouldn’t because nothing like it would get built again.
“Today, of course, you’d start with that assumption because of all the embodied carbon in the building.
“That was a little in my mind at the time, but not as much as today, when the view is where possible you don’t touch existing buildings.
“So, after three years of investigations – drilling, digging and studying – we’re pretty confident it was built a lot better than we even hoped, so we have applied for planning permission to keep it and extend it.
“If that’s successful, we’ll aim to be opening it by the end of 2025 – an amazing cultural venue to complement the others in the city.
“We already know the acoustics are extraordinary, whether it’s an electronic music event or a BBC Prom, both of which have been hosted there.”
Another artist’s impression of how The Printworks could look
This article is, naturally, far too short to do justice to the extent and depth of BL’s Canada Water project.
Even a brief walk to its borders reveals the sheer scale of the project, with plans for a new pedestrian bridge across Canada Water itself, which will also include work to boost wetland habitats and see the water level pumped up.
Already there’s been space made for charitable endeavours, work to help boost startups and a facelift for Surrey Quays Shopping Centre itself, including wallball courts and a new climbing wall.
Then there’s investment in a modular building for TEDI-London – a new higher education enterprise co-funded by King’s College London, Arizona State University and UNSW Sydney and focused on engineering – that was erected in only six weeks.
While some of these are temporary benefits, they significantly add to the buzz of the area and provide a flavour of BL’s direction of travel as the wider project continues to unfold.
“If we could do something here with applied engineering higher education, that would excite me,” said Roger.
“How we deal with the world always involves engineers sorting stuff out and I think, in the UK, the sector has had a bad rap in the past.
“The other things I think are crucial is what we do with the new high street, which will be along Deal Porters Way – what it means to build a space like that now and how we create the public spaces and routes to the amazing parks, docks and woods that are already here.
“We want to make it so that if you have nothing on your agenda for the weekend and you want to stay in London, then you’ll just go to Canada Water and all the amazing stuff that’s there.
“King’s Cross is great – I think this will be bigger, better and greener from a public space point of view.”
An artist’s impression of the first phase from Canada Water station
- Jon Massey is co-founder and editorial director of Wharf Life and writes about a wide range of subjects in Canary Wharf, Docklands and east London - contact via jon.massey@wharf-life.com
My interview with actor, playwright, author and star of this year’s Greenwich Theatre panto, Anthony Spargo, begins with farce.
I dial the number I think I’ve been given. There’s no reply. Eventually following an answerphone message a woman answers.
“Is this Anthony?” No, it’s Jane. I suppress an urge to shout “Oh no it isn’t”, and accept I’ve got the number wrong.
Time is short, I’m on a deadline.
Flustered, I check my handwriting and discover a four should be a nine. I can’t get through on this number either.
Then my phone rings. It’s Jane. Oh yes it is! She’s confused and baffled by the number of missed calls and we exchange embarrassed pleasantries.
Meanwhile, my phone fields another call.
This time it is Anthony, now available and ready to chat.
I hardly know who’s who and certainly not whether my contact with Jane is behind me or if there’s more to come.
Fortunately this all turns out to be excellent preparation for an interview about a show that’s full of top notch deception and cunning.
“One of the central themes in Robin Hood is disguise,” said Anthony, not Jane.
“Pretty much everyone is pretending to be someone who they’re not at some point.
“Robin gets to wear three or four disguises over the course of the panto.
“You can imagine the over-the-top, ridiculous costumes we have, including for some of the band – but we don’t want to reveal too much at this stage.”
A veteran panto villain – having spent 11 years on the Greenwich stage soaking up the boos and hisses of exercised audiences – Anthony has taken on a bigger role in 2022.
This is the first year he’s both written and appeared in the theatre’s festive production – taking on the mantle from Andrew Pollard who has left the team after a celebrated 15-year run as writer and dame.
While Anthony said he would undoubtedly miss acting opposite his old friend, audiences could expect the new show to be a descendant of their decade-long collaboration.
“It’s the same but different,” said Anthony.
“My main influence is, of course, 10 years of Greenwich pantos and I’ll miss Andy on stage.
“We remain really good friends and have a great chemistry – it’s rare to find someone you can bounce off – but he’d done 15 years here and that’s a long time.
“Writing and producing a panto really lasts a whole year. I started writing this one in March and had a draft by July – nice and early so the theatre could get on with designing and building the set and all the rest of it.
“Now the theatre’s artistic director, James Haddrell, is already talking to me about what we’re going to do next year and we haven’t even started the 2022 run yet.”
Martin Johnson will also return to Greenwich as Friar Tuck
Anthony is set to play the dastardly Sheriff Of Nottingham alongside David Breeds as Robin and Amy Bastani as Maid Marian.
Martin Johnson will return to panto in Greenwich as Friar Tuck, while long-serving musical director Steve Marwick is also back to handle the songs.
Dame duties will be the responsibility of Phil Sealey.
“I’ve worked with Phil in the past and he’s also damed before, up and down the country,” said Anthony.
“He’s great – I think audiences will take to him because he’s such a warm person. He’s larger than life and he’s going to be amazing.
“We have a fantastic cast this year, we’re getting on like a house on fire. There are some great singers and we’re really gelling.
“As for the show itself, it’s quite anarchic.
“What I’ve always liked about the pantos here is that they build and build until the climax at the end, which is often utterly ridiculous, overblown and as silly as panto should be.
“There’s a little bit of everything. Some comedy, some music, puppetry and a bit of magic. We’ve gone for a late medieval, ‘hey nonny-nonny’ vibe.
“Personally I love playing the villain. It’s the best part, you can get away with murder.
“I’ve always played my villains slightly unhinged, which allows you to have fun with the part and muck about – there’s a lot of eyebrow acting.”
Having discovered acting at school as a teenager before going to drama school, Anthony developed his writing in tandem, starting with sketches and skits and going on to take shows to Edinburgh and write more immersive pieces for Les Enfants Terribles.
With politics and current affairs fluid, the exact content of the show will remain in development until the curtain goes up, but its universal themes of greed, taxes and money – as well as people coming together to help each other – are already set in stone.
“Dare I say it, I think I enjoy the writing more than the acting these days,” said Anthony. “There’s something really special and exciting about creating a show from scratch.
“But when the audience is clapping and laughing it feels fantastic to be on stage. It’s a feeling like no other.
“There’s great warmth and joy when you’ve been able to make something that people are able to lose themselves in.
“People can come to the theatre, forget about what’s happening in the wider world, let go and have fun for a couple of hours.
“For me, the louder they boo, the better I’m doing my job. I’m really looking forward to it – I can’t wait to get going – and all we need now is the audience, the final cast member, to do that.”
Robin Hood runs at Greenwich Theatre from November 24 until January 8 with plenty of matinees and evening performances scheduled. Tickets cost £31.
- Jon Massey is co-founder and editorial director of Wharf Life and writes about a wide range of subjects in Canary Wharf, Docklands and east London - contact via jon.massey@wharf-life.com
Photographer Lorenzo Garrido never leaves his Greenwich home without a camera. He has thousands, perhaps millions, of photographs to show for it.
Most – from his childhood holidays right through to the eerie days of empty lockdown streets – sit undeveloped and unseen.
They have taken a back seat to his career, which has seen him photograph the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo and shoot campaigns for brands such as USC.
But while he is yet to fully showcase his collection to the world, he is about to start sharing the expertise he has gleaned from creating them.
The 28-year-old has launched a business, Greenwich Photo Tours, offering others an insight into favourite spots on his home turf and the best ways to capture them through a lens.
“I walk around with my camera all the time,” said Lorenzo.
“If I’m just stepping out of the house to have a stroll, or whatever, I’ll always have my camera with me.
“Greenwich is such a beautiful, picturesque space and, when I researched, I found nobody was doing a tour like this here.
“I wanted to take my expertise from my day job and bring it into a community space and put the two areas of my life together.”
Born and raised in Greenwich, he first began capturing images as a child.
Greenwich-based photographer Lorenzo Garrido
“My dad bought me a Polaroid camera when I was like 10 years old and straight away I was pretty obsessed,” said Lorenzo.
“I have a vivid memory of taking it on a Year Seven trip to France and shooting some pictures.
“I started doing street photography when I was about 16 and it opened up into this whole other world – that this could actually be your job.
“I just kind of stuck at it and went with it.”
Photography wasn’t a course option at his college, but Lorenzo studied art and design instead and just kept on clicking.
Despite his obsession with taking photographs and having his own darkroom at home, Lorenzo said most of the photos he takes in his spare time never see the light of day.
“I have a lot of work that I can’t even remember,” he said. “Heaps of negatives and undeveloped rolls of film that I have from over the years and I have no idea what’s on them.
“I’m just sitting on an insane amount of photographs.
“I’m sure they would serve some purpose to someone down the line, perhaps when they’re trying to look back at what it was like in the mid 2000s.”
Lorenzo said it was hard to find the time to organise his archive alongside his busy career.
He went freelance full-time in 2016 and has built up a name for himself in the music and fashion industries – mostly by word of mouth.
“I think being a Londoner, you have circles of friends that you grew up with and you get referred and brought in on jobs and then, if it goes well, you get more jobs,” he said.
“I’ve been quite lucky, I’ve not really had to chase work much or really rely on using things like social media.”
The tours cover a range of styles including street photography
In fact, search online and you won’t find much evidence of his commercial work, as he prefers to operate discreetly.
But recently he has shot a documentary at the Dr Martens factory in Northampton and was waste-deep in a lake in Snowdonia to shoot a campaign for brand USC.
One of his biggest clients is Sony Music.
“I do a lot of album artwork and press shots, headshots,” said Lorenzo.
“You do end up rubbing shoulders with a lot of people but I avoid name dropping at all costs, so I’ve probably just taught myself to push it all down.”
When nudged he does reveal a pretty big name though.
“I was on a job with Cristiano Ronaldo last week and he turned out to be a nice guy,” he said.
“The other 95% of the time, people have diva behaviour but I just keep my head down”.
“Especially this time of year when the autumnal light is low and gold and dances around. You can’t really take a bad picture there.”
Lorenzo is confident he has explored every part of Greenwich but said it still holds his interest and probably always will.
“I wanted to keep the tour very specific about the local community where I live because Greenwich is just such a beautiful place,” he said.
“It hasn’t been touched by gentrification too much so it’s kind of old school and I’m a bit of an old soul so I think that kind of works out.
“But London is always changing. When it does, you can rediscover it, which is pretty cool.”
Canary Wharf viewed from Greenwich Park
THE NITTY GRITTY
The two-hour tours are for those with their own digital or film camera.
They run every Saturday from 11am-1pm and cost £60 per person with a maximum of four people per tour.
The three-mile route starts at Borough Hall clock tower in Greenwich High Road and skirts around the market so people can try out street photography.
Next it will head to the Cutty Sark and along the riverside to the Old Royal Naval College.
Here the focus will shift to architectural photography and composition and clients will have five minutes to wander around.
Then it will be over to The Cutty Sark pub for river views before heading up Maze Hill and through the park to the observatory for a hill-top lesson on landscapes.
From there the tour will head back down into town for more street photography at the market.
