Published: 12 August, 2011

SHE died on Pat’s sofa in EastEnders and played Jack Duckworth’s “fancy lady” in Coronation Street, but Soho resident Marji Campi will return to her acting roots when she stars in a fringe production of new dark comedy, Country Life, at Rada in Bloomsbury next week.

Originally from Liverpool, Marji, who lives in Marshall Street, trained at the pioneering E15 acting school in the early 1960s and played Jessie Shadwick in Brookside.

She recently returned to Westminster after a spell living in Paris, and she told Diary: “Paris was easy to live in and a pleasant city, but what I missed about Soho was that my flat is a bit like a club.

People pop in and out all the time, actors who’ve been to see their agents or are between shows and others in the industry.”  

Set in the tranquil garden of a Devonshire cottage, Country Life follows the lives of Kenneth and Barbara, who are whiling away their autumn years amid cups of tea, bonfires and soft, buttery Madeira cake.

But when they meet a fellow mourner at the funeral of an old friend, a hornets’ nest of secrets is thrown open, shattering the peace of their old age.

Paul Blinkhorn, who is directing the show, said: “It think people will be surprised when they see it. This isn’t a typical fringe production. It’s not a cliché-ridden story about an old people’s home with a set that is two tables and two chairs.”

• Country Life is at the GBS Theatre, Rada, 62-64 Gower Street, WC1. 7pm, £10, concs £7, from August 15-20.

‘Village’ prepares for its annual fair

A GREEN oasis in the heart of the West End will host its third annual fair early next month.

Confirmed to attend are a cow, a donkey and possibly a couple of goats.

Residents are gearing up for the Phoenix Garden festival, a green-fingered extravaganza that will take place in the “hidden” garden as well as the nearby St Giles churchyard and is set to feature a “fruit and veg face on plate competition”.

Also aniticipated is the famous St Giles and Seven Dials in Bloom competition.

Animals from a “mobile farm” and the London Pride Morris Dancers will be among the attractions.

Jane Palm-Gold, one of the organisers, said: “The Women’s Institute is making industrial quantities of cake and jam this year because we ran out last year.

We are like a little village here. Everyone knows each other, and this is a great opportunity for the Phoenix Garden to get everyone together locally and to welcome visitors, too.”

Anyone interested in entering the gardening competition should email the organisers at happy.gardener@btinternet.com with their name, address, telephone number and the category they want to take part in.

• The St Giles Fayre will run on September 3 from 12-6pm.

Going Dutch - Pride’s pink pounding

CONTROVERSY surrounded this year’s Gay Pride march in the West End after a group of residents wrote to this newspaper to complain about what they called “a piss-up in a our communal living room” with street urination and drug-dealing allegedly rife.

Fifteen signatories, including Dean Street resident David Bieda, wrote: “As usual, local residents were not consulted or considered and the area was treated as though it’s an outdoor playground with no one living here.”

Other pictures submitted showed the mass of litter and broken glass in roadsides the morning after the festivities.

What a difference from Amsterdam’s Gay Pride event, which took place last weekend. On a trip to the Dutch capital, Diary saw no evidence of similar behaviour but rather a succession of pink floats making their way down canals thronged by families and couples who had come from far and wide to wave rainbow flags.

It should, of course, be noted that not everyone agreed with Mr Bieda and his fellow signatories.

Anonymous readers who left comments on the West End Extra’s website described the writers as “whining ninnies”, guilty of “horrid intolerance”.