Our Century and Us (1999-2000) was perhaps the most ambitious show by the Good Companions Company. We tried to take a look back over the whole life-span of members of the group and set their personal stories against the wider backdrop of changing times and big historical events. Starting with each person’s earliest memory, we progressed through school, work, marriage, parenting, combining work and family life, retirement, grand-parenting and even shared our hopes and fears for the future. The scenes were interspersed with music remembered from the time and performed by the company, accompanied by Olive Smith, now in her late 80s. This was a popular show playing throughout the Millennium Year and helping older audiences to remember and share key events in their own lives in the discussions, which followed every rehearsal.
The cast also travelled with this show to Cologne, Germany to participate in an international Festival of Senior Theatre, with more than twenty performing companies of older people from across the world. This was a very memorable experience. The show was then performed in 2000 at our own International Festival of Older People’s Theatre, ‘The Times of our Lives’, hosted by the European Reminiscence Network and Age Exchange and featuring companies from across Europe, USA and the far east.