‘The Wasp’ Teaser, Wanstead Golf Club & The Wanstead Curtain
East London Theatre Company’s latest production ‘The Wasp’ will be showing at the Wanstead Golf Club and The Curtain as part of the 2026 Wanstead Fringe Festival. The play, written by Morgan Lloyd Malcolm, is directed here by local theatre legend Jon Fentiman - whose other Fringe credits include: DNA (2022), Miss Julie (2024) and Constellations (2025), and stars Kylie Ann Ford and Chloe Orrock. I was kindly invited to drop into the crew’s third day of rehearsals and, quite frankly, I was astounded at how fantastic it was looking already!
To summarise the plot - two old school friends, Heather and Carla, are reunited in a coffee shop 20 years since they last saw each other. Heather has reached out to Carla under the guise of catching up - her true intentions are ambiguous, however. Despite the strangeness of the situation, Carla is going along with it.
The two women appear to come from very different worlds, the only thing they seem to have in common is that for a brief while at least they were friends at school. Everything about Heather is distinctly middle class - from her clothes, her manners, her way of speaking (which we learn had initially drew Carla to her, but later, alongside her glasses and plaits, became a reason for which the other girls relentlessly bullied her). Even her drinks order - a latte, followed by a chamomile tea because she’s ‘trying to be good’ demonstrates her middle class upbringing and attitudes. Carla, on the other hand, orders a much more salt-of-the-earth beverage - a builders tea, to which she adds milk and five sugars… to Heather’s obvious astonishment. Carla is dressed in tracksuit bottoms with a tucked in white tee and wears her hair in a topknot. As indicated through their conversation and personal history - Carla seems the more confident of the two, appearing effortlessly calm in comparison to Heather’s hectic, flustered behaviour. Initial scenes are chock full of clumsy interactions and uneasy moments, as the pair struggle to relate to one another. However, this play is far from surface level, and nothing is at first how it seems. Soon, a tug of war ensues between the two women as they struggle to assert themselves over the other.
Both women have their own host of issues and the play feels like a constant wrestle for power and one-upmanship between these two women. Whilst they come from different worlds, more unites them than initially meets the eye. They are both navigating the modern world and the many, constant challenges it presents for women - both entering a decade of their lives when the pressures of domesticity, finances, careers, etc. loom all the more ominously over them. This adaptation brilliantly picks apart their desperation for things to be simpler, easier. Both women are trapped in their own way, wracked with pressures - and are both united in their host of personal issues - problems begin to arise, however, as their solutions to these issues become dark and disturbing… Even in the short introductory snippet that I watched there were about three huge plot twists. The play begins sort of like a drama and it is wildly funny and entertaining enough just like this. Watching these two very different women struggle find common ground - with all the awkwardness and the tension as they reminisce about their brief shared history and minor commonalities - is enough to make you wince. But then the play manifests into more twists and revelations that keep coming like punches in a boxing match, each becoming wilder and stranger than the next.
There is some stellar acting here. A show with such a small cast can be tricky to pull off but both actresses do this work justice - and more. They really seem to embody their characters, making them feel thoroughly natural and lived in. John’s direction is, as ever, superb. The play feels so grounded in awkward reality and even when the preposterous epiphanies are divulged, they feel sincere and instinctive, not at all forced or ridiculous. I cannot wait to see how good this play gets, especially given this was only day three of rehearsals. I recommend everyone to grab your ticket now - this is sure to be an evening of fine drama, down to earth humour and endless entertainment through its many bombshells and sinister developments.
The Wasp previews at the Wanstead Golf Club on 18th & 19th September, then to The Curtain with evening performances from 23rd - 26th and matinees 24th and 26th.