Queer Play Reading Club - Es & Flo by Jennifer Lunn

Tuesday 21 October 2024
The Railway, Clapham

The Queer Play Reading Club is a monthly event celebrating LGBTQ+ playwriting in a supportive, social space designed to help Queer theatre-makers grow and make new connections. Held in partnership with Nick Hern Books, each session takes place as a table-read in the private upstairs room at The Railway, a Queer-run pub in Clapham.

We began the evening with brand-new Queer writing, offering emerging LGBTQIA+ playwrights the chance to share short scenes or monologues and receive generous, constructive feedback from fellow artists. This was followed by a group reading of Es & Flo with playwright Jennifer Lunn in attendance, joining Queer Theatre’s Artistic Director, Andrew Keates, for a relaxed discussion and Q&A about the creation and journey of this remarkable play.

This month’s play: Es & Flo by Jennifer Lunn

Es and Flo fell fiercely in love in the eighties, building a life together behind closed doors for more than forty years. As Es becomes increasingly forgetful, an unexpected carer arrives. Who sent her? What does she want? And can she be trusted?

As the outside world intrudes, Flo fights to protect the life they’ve built – and faces the hardest battle of all: holding on to the woman she loves.

A sharply observed and deeply compassionate drama, Es & Flo is coloured with memories of the Greenham Common Women’s Peace Camp. It celebrates an older lesbian relationship, the power of chosen family, and women coming together to fight for what matters. First produced by Wales Millennium Centre before moving to the Kiln Theatre in 2023, it won the Popcorn Group Writing Award and the Nancy Dean Lesbian Playwriting Award.

Everyone who attended took part in the read-through, enjoyed the informal atmosphere, and had the chance to ask Jennifer Lunn questions about her writing, process, and inspirations.

All photography by Boyan Georgiev