Children of the Peace: the history of the Players

The Company of the Special 60th Anniversary Production, from left: standing – Peter Evans, Bernard Lawrence, Laura Barber, Allan Yeoman, Megan Thompson, Olive Stubbs, Tom Holmes, Ken MacLeod, Jo Sanders, Sue Chapman, Maggie Robson, Peggy Forsyth, Edward Weedon, Alan York, Helen Rendall, Andrew Pink, Janet Cowen, Judith Elbourne, Irene Deeks, Dennis Erdwin, Jo Greene, David Coster, Roger Haworth, Andrew Dobson, Eve Haughton, Oliver Clement; kneeling – Danielle Gillett, Deborah Pollard; seated – Mike Waring, Felix Pring; also – Jamie Moreno, Patricia Reader, Jeff Bannister, Angela Bird, Michael Smith, Simon Reynolds

In 2006 the Players of St Peter celebrated their Diamond Jubilee – sixty years after the group was formed in the church of St Peter-upon-Cornhill in the City of London. Following the end of the Second World War a group of men and women decided to perform a religious play both as a thanksgiving for the return of peace and as a celebration of Christmas. Since 1951 the play has been taken from one of the medieval mystery cycles.

Over the years there have of course been many changes of actors and actresses, around an ongoing "core" of members who maintain the continuity and pass their knowledge on to those who form the nucleus for the succeeding generation. The Players have had the benefit of the talents of many people from many walks of life, including professionals from the theatrical, musical and creative worlds – this expertise has helped to strengthen the group as a whole. Always the aim has been to give the best possible production; to make it as accessible as possible to a modern audience; and to keep faith with the original works as they were devised more than 500 years ago.

There have been few changes of director, and the second, "Jock" Longstaff, was responsible for most of the productions in our first 25 years. Up to his death in 1995 he attended performances as often as his health allowed and was happy to see that the Players were still keeping the original tradition alive, in new ways. Olive Stubbs, our current director has so far created 26 productions, following a number of years as a performer (in which capacity she can still be seen from time to time).

In 1988 the Players had to leave St Peter-upon-Cornhill because of its change of use. After much serious searching we found and were made welcome at Holy Trinity Church, Sloane Street, SW1, but after ten years there it became necessary to move once again. And yet again, there was serious investigation of possible church venues, with a preference for the City of London, and we were invited to perform at our current home, St Clement Eastcheap.

One of the major differences between the various churches has been size – St Peter-upon-Cornhill is a small Wren church, built following the Great Fire of London. Holy Trinity was built at the end of the 19th century and it is large enough to be known as the Cathedral of the Arts and Crafts Movement. The Players' backstage area alone was not much smaller than the whole of St Peter's! At St Clement, which is another Wren church, we are once again pressed for space, and concentrate the production into an historic area approximately the size of the original stage area of the plays in medieval times. All this has helped to make the performances very varied over the years. We aim continually to discover new aspects, new insights and new ways of translating and presenting the medieval scenes to a modern audience.

We take pride in continuing to offer an entertainment that existed before Shakespeare but largely died out with the Reformation and has only come back into performance within the past century. The play texts that have survived lead us to wonder about the many texts lost from all over the country – for instance, of the London plays nothing survives.

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