Robin Hood at Greenwich Theatre

ANDREW Pollard has done it again. The writer, actor and now director and seasoned dame has put together another barn storming panto at Greenwich Theatre.

This year it’s Robin Hood and from the moments the lights go down and a version of Bon Jovi’s Living on a Prayer blasts out, the atmosphere is electric.

The next two hours zip by all too quickly jam packed as they are with plenty of gags, live music, dancing, magic, silliness, mayhem, and a fair few ad libs to spice things up a bit.

The action is set in Sherwood Forest – although there are plenty of local and topical references including an obligatory nod to this summer’s Olympics.

Robin Hood (Michael Harris) is hiding out in the forest with his band of merry men including Friar Tuck (Paul Critoph) and Alan McDale (Garry Ellis) robbing from the evil Sherrif (Anthony Spargo) and dishing out the loot to the poor.

However things start hotting up when he realises his childhood sweetheart Maid Marian (Arabella Rodrigo) is staying at the Sherrif’s castle with her nurse Joan Germoline (Pollard).

Pollard’s script is terrific, full of slapstick and manages to produce not one but three love matches, and his naughty naughty nursie is both saucy and silly.

With lots of interaction between the cast and the audience, amazing sets, outrageous costumes, a fabulous cast – particularly Anthony Spargo and his pet vulture – and plenty of jokes to please everyone’s tastes, this is a crowd pleaser of the best sort and proves that you don’t have to have big names to put on a great family show.

Pollard has once again set the bar by which other pantos are judged. It’s an absolute belter of a show and will have you laughing out loud way beyond Christmas.

Robin Hood is on at Greenwich Theatre, until January 6.

Tickets from £19, concessions £16.

Visit www.greenwichtheatre.org.uk or call 020 8858 7755

Ken Loach

FILM director Ken Loach is known for his hard hitting, gritty films which depict ordinary people telling working class stories.

So it comes as a bit of a surprise to find he is actually very gently and softly spoken.

What is not in doubt are his life long socialist values and beliefs which are evident in his treatment of social issues such as homelessness, poverty and labour rights in the films and documentaries he has made throughout his long and illustrious career.

He also has a penchant for egg custard tarts as I found out last week when I spoke to him ahead of a discussion he is leading at the Bussey Building in Peckham tomorrow.

"I've just got a mouthful of cake," he laughs by way of an introduction. "It was one of those egg custard tarts and it was very nice!"

Cake aside, Loach's career, which spans more than 50 years, is peppered with classics such as his documentary Cathy Come Home and films Kes, Riff-Raff, and The Wind That Shakes the Barley which won the prestigious Palme d'Or at the 2006 Cannes Film Festival.

And despite his age - he's 76 - he is not about to go and collect his pension either. His film Angel's Share was in cinemas earlier this year and he is currently working on a documentary on the post World War Two Labour government.

He is also preparing to take part in a post show discussion of The Ragged Trousers at Peckham's Bussey Building tomorrow.

The play, written by Stephen Lowe, has been adapted from Robert Tressell's 1914 book which charts a year in the life of a group of painters and decorators as they renovate a three-storey house for Mayor Sweater.

It traces their struggle for survival doing backbreaking work for low wages and the themes within it chime very well with those Loach has featured in his films over the years.

"The issue of workers creating wealth for other people is still very relevant," he says. "I read the book about 50 years ago but have never seen the play so I'm very much looking forward to it.

"It was written at about the same time the Labour party was formed and is a classic piece of socialist and working class literature. I know so many people who have been influenced by it, myself included.

"It's about how the system works and has to if it's to function. It explores the issues facing working people and it exposes the mechanism of society and how the wheels go round.

"It also goes right back to the inception of the Labour Party which I don't think has ever been a socialist party," he says. "It was trying to make capitalism work for ordinary people and that was its fatal flaw.

"It has never stood for the ideas on which it was founded which makes this such an important book."

I ask him if it's significant the play is being performed in Peckham.

"Peckham is one of those areas where people feel so alienated and removed from the sense they own or have any share in how society is run and feel they have nothing to lose," he says.

"That's what was so evident about the riots. It was an inarticulate shout of rage. It certainly shows us something is wrong with the way we organise society.

"This book shows that very clearly. These are ordinary people who are faced with similar issues to us now - unemployment or a cut in wages or the dismantling of the Welfare State which was actually Labour's biggest achievement.

"The system now can't pay for it and people are faced with the reality of that in their daily struggle.

"What we need is a new mass party of the left - what Labour should have been."

I ask him if he wants to set it up.

"I think it's a bit beyond me!" he laughs. "But I will be there waving the flag!"

jogging along nicely

THERE is no doubt the Olympics, and now the Paralympics, have had a positive effect on the nation.

Inspiring and energising, the Games have encouraged people to take more of an interest in sporting activities.

Indeed, if my kids are anything to go by London 2012, and Team GB’s success in the medals table, have been responsible for inspiring many youngsters to pester their parents to sign them up for lessons in swimming, gymnastics, football, tennis and horseriding among others.

But for adults who want a piece of the action there are possibilities to get involved too - even for those who like me haven’t seen the inside of a gym for longer than we care to remember and the only running we do is for a bus.

Indeed the closest I’ve got to wearing trainers in the last eight years is the fashion kind, not the ones I used to go running in before I had kids....

So coupled with a long-held desire to get back into shape and buoyed by the enthusiasm the Olympics has generated, I found myself on Wandsworth Common a couple of weeks ago to give my body an utter pounding – or as the instructor would have me say, a total workout.

As I am clearly never going to have the physique or fitness levels of the likes of Jessica Ennis nor can I ever have a hope of getting an Olympic medal I did wonder what I had let myself in for when I saw trainer James Osborn bringing out the “equipment”. This included kettle bells of various weights, two enormous tractor tyres and harnesses.

I felt even more like a fish out of water when I saw the seven others who were there to be put through their paces. All had clearly done this before and were up for the challenge. I meanwhile, was quaking in my brand new trainers.

The session was run by James who along with business partner Steve Mellor set up their company Freedom2Train 13 months ago.

The two are fully qualified personal fitness trainers and initially offered one-to-one training sessions. However, earlier this year they decided to branch out and offer specially designed outdoor-based high intensity work outs to small groups.

And what they don’t know about training your bodies into peak physical perfection frankly isn’t worth knowing.

The hour-long classes are designed to help people lose weight, tone muscles, become stronger and get super fit. All fitness levels are catered for and as a newbie one of the key pieces of advice was that I was to take it at my own pace and to take rest breaks when I needed to.

So successful have their classes been they are normally booked up well in advance.

After all the introductions were out of the way James got things rolling by taking us on a gentle jog around the Common before getting us to do a series of lunges, squats, stretches, kicks, jumps and sprints to warm up.

I managed this OK but it was clearly the physical calm before the storm as after we had all warmed up nicely we were divided into two groups for the main session.

This involved a set of lifting and flipping over tractor tyres - much harder than it looked and I am ashamed to say made me look and feel like a weakling - swinging and lifting kettle bells, slamming special 5kg slam balls into the ground and sprinting - or in my case trying to sprint - while strapped in a harness and being pulled back by a team member.

All were done in short bursts of about two minutes each with two minute rest breaks after each set and had me utterly exhausted.

James explained the aim is to get the whole body working.

He said: "There are so many benefits to exercise and giving the whole body a complete work out especially if it's done in the open air.

"We wanted to offer something that was a bit different, challenging and dynamic that exercised all muscles but was also fun.

"It's quite addictive and the vast majority of people who have come along for a taster session have signed up for more."

To my utter amazement I found myself getting into the sets although trying to lift the tractor tyre off the ground and flip it over defeated me despite my best efforts.

I even managed to master the art of slamming the ball and crouching down in time to catch it and as the session wore on I found I had more energy than I thought.

Being in the open air too was great and much more refreshing than pounding the treadmill at a gym looking at the wall.

But what was most brilliant was the constant encouragement from James who was an inspiration in the way he kept me going when what I was tempted to do was collapse in a heap on the grass.

Before too long we were ready to warm down with a series of press ups on the tyres, stretches, lunges and sit ups.

Although it was seriously hard work and I could barely walk afterwards, I survived, felt energised and felt a real sense of achievement. So much so I have signed up for more!

Visit www.freedom2train for training session times and prices.

Cardenio

A PLAY which is often referred to as Shakespeare's lost play is currently enjoying a short run at the Rose Theatre in Park Street.

Cardenio has been attributed to Shakespeare, Thomas Middleton and John Fletcher since an anonymous manuscript was submitted to the censor in 1611. Debate has abounded since but there is still no clear definitive proof of who actually did write it.

Whoever penned the words, it is without doubt a fascinating and disturbing play that deals with love, lust, obsession, amorality, suspicion and ultimately revenge and has many of the hallmarks of the three playwrights.

The current production, by the Aporia Theatre Collective is set in feudal Japan with the cast dressed as Samurai warriors or wearing kimonos.

Cardenio, in love with Luscinda, is banished by the tyrannical King Fernando who wants her for himself. Despite his protestations of love she wants nothing to do with him and flees to be with Cardenio.

The King tries all the evil tricks in the book to win her love but to no avail and with each dastardly idea that goes wrong and her rejection, he descends further into madness.

Meanwhile, in a sub plot, Anselmo wants to test the fidelity of his wife Camilla but she ends up falling in love and being seduced by Lotario, the man sent to test her.

The play is bloody and by the end the stage is littered with bodies.

The setting is amazing, with the actors on a small staged area overlooking some of the excavated remains of this Elizabethan theatre which is picked out with blue lights.

The young cast are impressive particularly Ryan Burkwood as the King who displays a jittery nervousness and tyrannical anger while simultaneously getting more mad by the second.

It is a great production and for a play not often performed, catch it while you can.

Cardenio is on at the Rose Theatre, Park Street until Saturday, September 29. Tickets cost £12. Call the box office on 020 7261 9565.

Walking tour with a twist

As those who know me well will testify, I love a good mystery and exploring new places. So when an invitation came through to solve a crime while on a walking tour of the "Sins of Southwark" I didn't hesitate to sign up.

The Hidden Wonder mysteries are not your average run of the mill walking tours. Oh no. These are much more interesting and exciting. Instead they are a three-hour walk around a given area with the outline of a story, a set of questions and a map.

The idea is simple. Each hunt focuses on a mystery that the hunters must unravel by solving puzzles along the route which takes in pubs, churches, theatres, galleries, museums and hidden gardens.

To crack the case, the hunters need to answer the questions by finding clues which can be found along the way. These can be anything from inscriptions on monuments, street names or a sign on a building and many are extremely cryptic.

What adds to the fun is that you will also learn about the hidden history, culture and secrets of the places you are exploring.

As befits any good adventure, you'll need to use your brain as well as your feet. But if you have a desire to explore and an inquisitive mind, then Hidden Wonders mysteries are made for you.

The brains behind it all is Robert Collett who came up with the idea with two friends because he wanted to find out more about London and its history.

Each tour has taken them months of painstaking research spent pounding the streets and alleyways, and hours pouring over books in libraries, to create the mystery which needs to be solved.

There are currently four tours to choose from each focusing on specific areas of the city and all of which are suitable for any age.

I chose the Sins of Southwark, partly because it's close to home, but also because of its literary theme as it features three of my favourite authors, Geoffrey Chaucer, William Shakespeare and Charles Dickens - who all have links to the area.

I roped my friend and fellow literary fan Adele to come with me and we met Robert and the other people who were taking part at the George Inn off Borough High Street.

We divided ourselves into teams and were each given instructions, a map and set of questions before heading off.

The crime we had to solve was a death involving just three people. The mystery took us down Borough High Street, Southwark Street and Bankside, along the river, down numerous back streets, through gardens, Borough Market and even a graveyard, past churches and two theatres and up to the Tate before heading back to the pub.

Along the way we found out more about the three authors and the playhouses, pubs and prostitutes that once made these streets the playground of London.

It was fascinating stuff and along the way we stumbled on places and buildings we had either walked passed and never really seen before or simply didn't know they existed.

In one pub, which I confess to have frequented a considerable number of times, I was astonished to see a picture relating to some fascinating facts about Dickens but which I had previously walked passed and ignored.

At Borough Market, another place I love to visit, I discovered the table of rents board which was another blindingly obvious but nonetheless - to me - a previously invisible fixture of the market which I had never properly acknowledged before.

Being a competitive sort I was desperate to get all the clues correct and thus find out the truth about how the person in our story had died.

Some of the clues were relatively easy but some were extremely tricky and Adele and I spent ages at a few locations furiously scratching our heads trying to work out the fiendishly devious ones.

Once we had discovered all the clues, we stopped at the Tate for a quick cuppa and to give us a chance to work out who had done what and who had died.

It wasn't as easy as it seemed though and there was a fair bit of exercising the grey cells to work it out.

Once we thought we had cracked it we hot footed it back to the pub where we met the other teams to see who had got it right.

Unfortunately Adele and I hadn't - mainly due to putting the wrong answer down to one of the clues. But despite this schoolgirl error, which we kicked ourselves over, it was a great way to spend three hours on a Saturday morning.

The genius of it is the inventiveness of it. It was extremely interesting, clever and fun and although we didn't get the answers 100 per cent spot on, we had a huge amount of fun doing it and we learned a great deal more about this fascinating city. And at a tenner each, great value for money.

I'm now off to book a place at the others!

www.hiddenwonders.co.uk