Transferring fresh from the Edinburgh Fringe, Cherie My Struggle is an intimate, gossipy memoir recounting Cherie Blair’s amazing journey from an obscure Liverpool convent to the epicentre of power in Westminster.
In this new political comedy Cherie spills the beans on the New Labour years and delivers her uncensored thoughts about Alistair Campbell, Carole Caplin, John Smith, Jeremy Corbyn, Diane Abbott, the Queen, Princess Anne, Margaret Thatcher and Gordon Brown.
Barrister, mother, prime ministerial consort and all-round superwoman, Cherie has never received the appreciation she deserves. Before her, the PM’s spouse was a marginal or anonymous figure and she put the role on the world stage. Played by Mary Ryder (The Governess, Theatre Royal, Bury St Edmunds; Hollyoaks; EastEnders) we now have the opportunity to see another side to this enigma. Penned by journalist and parliamentary sketch writer Lloyd Evans, this dramatic exploration allows Cherie to set the record straight with all the gossip and the historical details drawn from verifiable sources.
Her front-row seat during Blair’s ten years in power allowed her personal insights into the triumphs and calamities of the New Labour project, from the landslide victory of May 1997, to the turmoil of the Iraq war in 2003.
Lloyd Evans comments, “People ask me if the play is a hatchet-job. And it is, but with Cherie wielding the hatchet. A QC who specialises in libel law came to see a preview of the show just in case anything in it might upset Cherie. He said the only thing that would upset her is that she wasn’t invited.”
Aiming to transform audiences’ views of Cherie, the production at the Hen & Chickens is a mere stone’s throw away from where the Blairs themselves lived in Richmond Crescent. Lloyd Evans has created a masterstroke of ingenuity which presents historical and political accuracy interspersed with satire, allowing us to finally see the woman behind the man. …an articulate, intimate audience with one of the most understatedly formidable women of the 21st century
Cherie My Struggle is at Hen and Chicken’s Theatre 10th– 14th September 2019.
