We are delighted to be able to put on two extra performances of Sweet Thames: The London Folk Club Heritage Project verbatim theatre performance with Ewan Wardrop in October 2023 in Sussex. Our funders, The National Lottery Heritage Fund, have agreed for us to use our project contingency budget to make these free to all. We anticipate places to be snapped up quickly and it is essential to book a seat. So do so now using the links below.
Saturday 21st October 2023
New Port Arms, The Lady Bee Marina, Southwick, BN42 4EG
https://thenewportarms.co.uk
Doors open 7pm with project exhibition viewing. Performance starts at 8pm ends 10pm.
Book here.
Sunday 22nd October 2023
Lewes Con Club, 139 High Street, Lewes, BN7 1XS
https://www.lewesconclub.com
2:45pm Introduction to the project with exhibition viewing.
3:30pm Floor spots from the audience (as would take place in a folk club)
4:15pm Interval
4:30pm Ewan Wardrop’s Musical verbatim theatre performance
5:30pm End
Book here.
Thanks to the National Lottery Players for making this possible.
This musical verbatim theatre performance is set in a London folk club in the early 1960s and draws on twenty-five oral history interviews recently collected for Sweet Thames: The London Folk Club Heritage Project.
It is written and performed by Ewan Wardrop; actor, dancer, multi-instrumentalist and musical comedian. Ewan began his career as a dancer for Matthew Bourne’s dance company, performing around the world, on Broadway and in the West End. As an actor he has appeared in productions for Shakespeare’s Globe, The RSC, The Old Vic, Kneehigh Theatre and Complicite amongst many others. In 2012 Ewan wrote and performed in a critically acclaimed one man show on the life of George Formby for the Edinburgh Festival. He is a member of The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain and step dances and plays banjo ukulele with The Servants Ball. He also created the experimental Morris side, The Bo Diddlers.
Over six months, Ewan has immersed himself in the Sweet Thames interview recordings and transcriptions to create this one-man one hour show. It is scripted almost entirely word-for-word from the actual interviews and all twenty five interviewees are represented in the performance. One extra interview, recorded on-line at a reminiscence event for the project is also included.
Expect something folky, familiar, but altogether quite different.
Images by Sue Swift
