A love story retold
Es & Flo – a new play inspired by the writer’s grandmothers and the women of Greenham Common – is now showing at Wales Millennium Centre, writes Jenny White...
WALES Millennium Centre’s latest original production, Es & Flo, tells the story of the fierce love of an older interracial lesbian couple who met at the Greenham Common Women’s Peace Camp. Writer Jennifer Lunn’s script for Es & Flo has already won two awards (the Popcorn Writing Award 2020 and the Nancy Dean Lesbian Playwriting Award 2022), but its theatrical release was delayed due to the pandemic. The longawaited play finally opened at Wales Millennium Centre’s Weston Studio yesterday, before playing at the Kiln in London in June.
Leading the cast of five female characters are star of Netflix’s Sex Education Doreene Blackstock, who plays Flo, and theatre and TV actor Liz Crowther, who plays Es. The play is directed by Susie Mckenna, who leads an all-female creative team.
“Es & Flo is about an older lesbian couple who have been together for 40 years,” explains Jennifer Lunn. “Before they got together, Es was married to a man and had a son, but she’s kept her relationship with Flo from him.
“When the play starts, Es is beginning to become forgetful around the house, showing the early signs of dementia. And, when someone arrives at their door, it starts an unravelling of their situation and an explosion of secrets.”
The play is inspired by Lunn’s grandmothers – called Es and Flo – who she says are “the DNA of this play”. One grandmother had dementia and the other carried a huge secret for most of her life.
Lunn recalls: “My grandmother lived with dementia for many years. As a family, we had to navigate the long, complex, unpredictable journey, adjusting our own roles within it while holding on to our relationships with her – relationships which were still full of joy, humour, and love.
“Often people are written off when they’re diagnosed with dementia, but I wanted to honour the reality of the experience of people living with it and their family and carers – and to celebrate the incredible love and care at the heart of these lives.”
As Es deteriorates, her daughter-in-law Catherine (played by Swansea actor Michelle Mcternan) arrives to try to persuade her to go into
a care home. But Flo, who has lived happily with Es for decades, is not willing to let this happen.
“I love the fact Flo still has so much fight in her,” says Doreene Blackstock. “She’s fiery and passionate and, having been an active member of the Greenham Common Peace Camp in the 1980s, she still has that activism in her to fight for what is right and what she believes in.
“She loves Es deeply and continues to grow with this woman, even though part of her is slipping away and she’s desperate to hold on to what’s precious to her.”
“Es and Flo are fascinating characters,” adds Liz Crowther. “They’re intelligent women who’ve had interesting jobs – Flo a librarian and Es a teacher – but both have been very affected by Section 28.
“Es also had her son taken away from her because she was deemed unfit to look after him, which happened to many women at Greenham. Not only does Es feel deeply ashamed about losing her son, but this has also complicated her relationship with Flo and the pair haven’t legalised their relationship, which now makes things difficult for them as they face being separated.”
Es & Flo is coloured with memories of the Greenham Common Women’s Peace Camp, which began its life with a protest march led by women from Cardiff walking to Greenham in 1981, objecting to cruise missiles being located there. This feminist movement serves as a springboard for the main characters’ relationship, which first began when they met as activists in the 1980s.
During the rehearsal process, the cast met with some of the brave women of Greenham Common and their daughters at the Hilldrop Community Centre in Kentish Town, London.
“Meeting these women made us all realise how incredibly important and brave they were – and how unrecognised they were, especially while having to put up with the dreadful things that were being said about them,” says Crowther. “They made an enormous difference with their nonviolent direct action, but it’s often forgotten. “These women were so resourceful and had the most incredible set-up – they had something called the ‘Telephone Tree’ where women would do chain letter-style telephone calls to spread the word. It’s remarkable to think that, in December 1982, 30,000 women held hands around the nine-mile missile base in protest. A good friend of mine was there and the women pinned photos of their families and their kids’ ‘babygrows’ to the walls. They simply wanted a safe future for their children.”
Blackstock says: “I vividly remember this period – it was a time of discontent with many other strikes happening, such as CND, the miners’ strikes and the rise against Thatcherism.
“I was working in Theatre-in-education in Coventry at that time and anyone who was politically minded would try to support the cause in some way. We would run collections at the end of our shows and send the money to the women at Greenham.
“We also educated kids in schools about what was going on – telling them about these women who were saving lives.”
In the play, Es’ Polish carer Beata, played by Adrianna Pavlovska, brings her daughter Kasia with her while she’s working. In Cardiff, the role of Kasia is shared between two young actors from south Wales – Reesie Dupe and Mirella Siciliano. At Greenham, Es had been a ‘book lady’ who read with the children and she and Kasia form a strong bond.
“Es has an incredible connection with children and that’s revitalised when she meets Kasia,” says Crowther. “It’s been wonderful working with the young actors. Each Kasia has a different personality and brings a different quality, shaping how we act with them.
“Each Kasia expresses the emotions so well,” adds Blackstock. “I feel that we’re watching them evolving in front of our eyes – they are really listening and learning, helped a lot by our associate director Alice Eklund, who’s great with young people and has marked up their script and drawn pictures of the set to help them learn.”
Lunn has loved watching the story she wrote to honour her grandmothers and the women of Greenham come alive in rehearsals.
“I want to tell stories about all kinds of women,” she says. “We don’t have enough good strong female leads on stage – especially older women or those from historically excluded communities.
“I’m thrilled to have such an extraordinary team on this play. It feels like the rehearsal room really reflects the play – with the brilliant Susie Mckenna at the helm guiding these five different but equally brilliant women, coming together to make something magic happen. It really is such a privilege.”
I vividly remember this period – it was a time of discontent with many other strikes happening, such as CND, the miners’ strikes and the rise against Thatcherism
■ Es & Flo is at Wales Millennium Centre’s Weston Studio until May 13. Tickets are available now at www.wmc.org.uk