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Lockdown gave me time to write my own play, says ‘stage addict’ Cush Jumbo

Cush Jumbo is joining in celebrations for the 30th anniversary of the Brit School (Dave Benett)
Cush Jumbo is joining in celebrations for the 30th anniversary of the Brit School (Dave Benett)

Cush Jumbo is planning a stage return in a new one-woman show written during lockdown.

The actress, seen playing Hamlet at the Young Vic last year, said her time at the Brit School in Croydon had made her “a stage addict”. She said: “It [theatre] is where I have to go back to refuel between television and film so I will always do a play every couple of years until I die.

“I wrote something over the lockdown which I’m currently piecing together.”

The 36-year-old, inset, star of hit US TV series The Good Wife and The Good Fight, stayed tight-lipped on the details but said: “It’s something I’ve wanted to write for a long time. But I’ve been back to back for a long time and you really need the space and time to marinate and write. The lockdown was really a bit of a gift for me because I wasn’t allowed to do anything for a few months.”

Jumbo, who won an emerging talent prize at the 2013 Evening Standard Theatre Awards for her one-woman play about singer and dancer Josephine Baker, is briefly returning to the stage tomorrow in a show celebrating the 30th anniversary of the Brit School.

The actress, now a trustee of the school, said going there at 14 was “a gateway to a whole other world”. She regularly returns to speak to students.

Jumbo recently finished filming fencing thriller Balestra, “a cross between Black Swan and Inception”. She said she fell in love with fencing: “The fact your partner can’t see your face [makes] you feel like a superhero.”