*
WARD COUNCILLOR CAROL. The last section is one dear to Julie’s heart.
She’s the hanging-basket queen of London Road.
The runner-up er – with a garden
That we could see the improvement to from last year,
Ya know. Erm –
Inga noted the weed – the weeding that had been done.
Janet and family of 68 come to the front.
*
Applause.
CROWD. Wheyy!
*
CROWD MEMBER. Well done.
JAN. Thank you very much.
WARD COUNCILLOR CAROL. You’re welcome.
JAN. Mwaa.
GEMMA. Look at me please. Everyone smile.
Repeat x 2.
*
WARD COUNCILLOR CAROL. Now there is the absolute winner.
CROWD. Whoo. (Claps in anticipation.)
WARD COUNCILLOR CAROL. An’ it is. (Beat.) For the second year running
I do believe. Alfie!
*
Applause.
CROWD. Wheyy! Yeah!
WARD COUNCILLOR CAROL. Ahh. Well done.
GEMMA. Look at me please. Everyone smile.
Everyone smile.
Everyone smile.
Everyone smile.
*
JULIE. I think this is absolutely fantastic.
So many people here tonight.
I haven’t counted you all.
Seein’ everybody have a great time,
That’s what it’s all about.
Gettin’ together as a community.
Neighbours havin’ fun, havin’ drinks together
and really getting on with each other.
*
Applause.
CROWD. Wheyy! Yeah!
GEMMA. Look at me please. Everyone smile.
*
JULIE. I would like to congratulate everyone
That’s really worked hard on their gardens.
Even the people that haven’t won.
It doesn’t matter –
It’s sharing their gardens with everyone else
And really workin’ hard
And makin’ London Road what London Road is –
A fantastic road!
*
Applause.
CROWD. Wheyy!
GEMMA. Look at me please. Everyone smile.
*
GORDON. I’d just like to point out as well.
It does seem that God is smiling on London Road.
Cos if you’d seen the weather forecast for today.
Well look at it now.
Repeat x 9.
Original audio recordings of various residents at the party are heard over the PA in the auditorium. They fade out as the music of the song begins.
Song – ‘London Road in Bloom’ (reprise)
JULIE. I got nearly seventeen hangin’ baskets in this back garden – believe it or not. Begonias, petunias an’ – erm – impatiens an’ things.
ALFIE. Marigolds, petunias. We got up there, we got busy Lizzies, hangin’ geraniums alright – /see the hangin’ lobelias, petunias in the basket – hangin’ basket. That’s a fuchsia.
DODGE. /There’s all sorts in that basket anyway.
JAN. Err there is a special name I just call them lilies. They’re a lily type. There is a special name. An’ for the first time this year I’ve got a couple of erm – baskets.
TERRY. Hangin’ baskets, variegated ivy in there which makes a nice show. Then you’ve got err these sky-blue whatever they are ve – ver – ber la la. That’s err little purple ones.
HELEN. Rhubarb, the old-fashioned margarites, the daisies.
GORDON. The roses have done really well this year.
HELEN. Gave an extra point for havin’ basil on the windowsill didn’t she. /Ha ha ha.
GORDON. /Yeah.
The End.
ALECKY BLYTHE
In 2003, Alecky founded Recorded Delivery, whose first production, Come Out Eli, premiered at the Arcola Theatre, London, and later transferred to the BAC (winner of the Time Out Award for Best Performance on the Fringe). The company went on to make All the Right People Come Here (New Wimbledon Theatre). Alecky has since created Strawberry Fields (The Courtyard, Hereford); Cruising (Bush Theatre, London); The Girlfriend Experience (Royal Court Theatre and Young Vic, London); I Only Came Here for Six Months (KVS and Les Halles, Brussels); and Do We Look Like Refugees?!, a joint project for the National Theatre Studio and the Rustaveli Theatre, Georgia (Assembly Rooms, Edinburgh Festival Fringe, 2010; winner of Fringe First Award). London Road won Best Musical at the Critics’ Circle Awards and was revived in 2012 in the Olivier auditorium at the National Theatre after its production in the Cottesloe in 2011. For television she has written A Man in a Box (IWC and Channel 4) and The Riots: In Their Own Words (BBC2).
ADAM CORK
Adam Cork’s theatre work includes scores and sound designs for Danton’s Death, Phèdre, All’s Well That Ends Well and Time and the Conways at the National; ENRON at Chichester Festival Theatre, Royal Court, West End and Broadway; Romeo and Juliet and The Tempest for the RSC; King Lear, Red (also Broadway), A Streetcar Named Desire, Othello, The Chalk Garden, Creditors, The Wild Duck, John Gabriel Borkman and Caligula at the Donmar Warehouse; Hamlet (also Broadway), Ivanov and Madame de Sade for the Donmar at Wyndham’s; King Lear at Liverpool Everyman and Young Vic; No Man’s Land and A View from the Bridge at the Duke of York’s; Six Characters in Search of an Author at the Gielgud and Chichester; Don Carlos at Gielgud and Sheffield; The Glass Menagerie at the Apollo; The Last Days of Judas Iscariot and The Late Henry Moss at the Almeida; Faustus and Paradise Lost for Headlong; and The Cherry Orchard at Sheffield Crucible. In 2011 he won the Olivier Award for Best Sound Design for King Lear. In 2010 he won the Tony Award for Best Sound Design of a Play for Red, and was nominated for Best Original Score and Best Sound Design for ENRON. He was previously nominated for the Best Sound Design of a Play Tony for Macbeth (2008). He was nominated for an Olivier Award for Best Sound Design for Suddenly Last Summer (2005); as well as for four Drama Desk Awards: Outstanding Music in a Play for Frost/Nixon (2007) and Red (2010), and Outstanding Sound Design for Macbeth (2008) and ENRON (2010). Film and TV includes Frances Tuesday, Macbeth, Re-ignited, Imprints, Bust and Tripletake. Radio includes Losing Rosalind, The Luneberg Variation, The Chalk Garden, The Colonel-Bird, Don Carlos, Othello and On the Ceiling.
A Nick Hern Book
London Road first published in Great Britain as a paperback original in 2011 by Nick Hern Books Limited, The Glasshouse, 49a Goldhawk Road, London W12 8QP
This ebook edition first published in 2014
London Road copyright © 2011 Alecky Blythe and Adam Cork
Alecky Blythe and Adam Cork have asserted their right to be identified as the authors of this work
Cover image of aerial view of Ipswich, UK, by Getmapping
Cover design by Ned Hoste, 2H
Typeset by Nick Hern Books, London
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978 1 78001 170 7 (ebook edition)
ISBN 978 1 84842 176 9 (print edition)
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