- [Sarah-Jane] Reenactment is as close
as we can get to a time machine.
- [Lisa] When you're in costume and you're in character
and you're surrounded by a site
that's hundreds of years old,
you've got the walls, you've got the fabric around you.
It's magical, and it does give
a snapshot of history to people.
- [Tom] I remember, as a child, if something cool
or dangerous happened, I'll remember that a lot longer
than just reading a sign.
So I think children have long memories
and it's our job to help plant those memories.
- My name is Sarah-Jane Worrall,
and the character I play is an ARP,
Air Raid Precautions, welfare worker.
- I'm Lisa Dickson, and I'm a knight.
- My name is Jake, I do sword fighting shows as a knight.
- My name's Tom, and I work for English Heritage
largely as a fool or jester.
- My name's Mark Griffin,
I'm going to be portraying a legionary
from the classic invasion period of England,
when the Romans really conquered the country.
- Fooling is a large part of my life,
but at the moment, my main job is to be a father.
I'm a brand new father.
My little boy has been pretty full on,
a baptism of fire for me, and I've enjoyed it.
- I've got my old pony here at this yard.
I can't ride her. She's far too small, but she's sweet.
She's 25, her name's Jem, Jemima Puddle Duck,
And we go for little walks around the lane,
I took up archery recently.
I'm not a great shot, but I do enjoy it.
There's something just quite different about it.
- This year I've been a dad for the first time.
So it's really, really exciting for me at the moment.
I have a two-month-old son, Leo,
and he's absolutely fantastic.
I've always loved being at work and always loved doing that,
but now I'm finding myself going,
"I can't wait to get back and see the boy."
(horn fanfare plays)
(playful music)
(bells jingle)
- A lot of people have studios, workshops
and I have, I have a shed.
I went to drama school
and thought I'd be the next Brad Pitt.
And that didn't happen.
I know! How dare they!
But with physical theatre you have to work with props.
And I picked up a sword and I loved it.
Sword work is a way into history.
- What keeps me interested in history
is the unknown stories.
There is something really mystical about history
because everything that we know is somebody's perspective.
The research we have is what's been written down
by somebody else.
- I came at it more from a dressage point of view.
Dressage means preparing the horse for war.
My horse was extremely brave and just took to it
like a duck to water.
The rest is history, as they say,
we went on from there.
- I'm sure chartered accountants around the country
would love to swing a sword around.
(dramatic music)
- What we do is very dangerous.
We say, "you're going to play with swords,
you're going to get hit."
I think the worst thing that I have had happened
was I took it the point of a dagger
into just above my eyebrow.
We're in armour, we're in real armour, it's very heavy
and the weapons, they're blunted,
but the tip of the blade is still traveling 80, 90,
100 miles per hour. If you get hit with them,
you're going to get hurt.
So we make full contact in a very controlled way,
which means the armour has got to be
as authentic as possible.
Authenticity is so important
when people are trying to watch it
because we don't want to be telling them a lie.
(upbeat music)
- Originally, this was a stable, probably,
in the 18th century and I've turned it into
a sort of a workshop basically.
So there's woodworking lathes, there's pillar drills.
There's lots of grinders and polishers,
but upstairs is where all the costumes are kept.
All these things we've made
or acquired over the years,
and it just builds up and builds up and builds up
until you've got nearly a thousand costumes.
And Victorian farm workers, there's a 1940s mac,
English Civil War bucket boots to a medieval riding boots,
Napoleonic soldier's shoes,
and the shoes need upkeeping and repairing and polishing
and waxing and oiling and goodness knows what else.
You can't get to it because of the heap of stuff!
Well in here, I've got gloves, ties, shirts,
cravats, more gloves, purses and pouches,
a hundred pairs of braces, leggings,
officer's swagger sticks, that's a Russian soldier's coat,
no idea what that's doing there.
And that's a Benedictine habit, so there we go.
Not high fashion, but it'll do.
(playful music)
- I do a whole stilt show where I get up without help.
And then you rise like a phoenix!
I have been practicing.
Just, you just rise!
It's more mind over matter.
I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm in full control.
And it is scientifically, physically almost impossible.
Very difficult, Ah! Sorry, just, a.
When you think you're going to fall off, you fall off.
Um, have you got a stick?
But also fire breathing.
It's expected, everybody thinks an idiot can do it.
And it is quite hard.
So I have been practicing with the firebrands.
It's a stupid thing to do, I wouldn't recommend it.
- [Jake] Practicing archery, it's a lot of fun
and I always try to get better.
You've got to keep on training,
you got to keep on practicing and just make sure
your instincts are still as sharp as they can be.
- [Lisa] The horses that we pick for jousting,
they are hand-picked and the ones that genuinely enjoy it
are the ones that do the shows.
My horse is called Fireworks.
We train every day.
He is very much in the starting stages
of becoming a war horse.
He is used to loud noises around him.
We use barrels on him before we even get to the point
where a rider gets on him in armour.
I think he enjoys his work.
He's always sort of straight to the stable door
whenever you go into the yard every day.
And he's a very buzzy little thing.
He never wants to say no to anything and he never tires.
- So I'm doing pretty much what all reenactors
will be doing now, starting the season off,
getting everything out, checking it over,
making sure it's all in working condition.
So we do things like polishing sword blades
to make sure that there's no surface rust or anything,
and the same with the armour as well.
Also there's things like repairing the shields,
making launces, we're a mobile living museum
and because it's outside and because people are handling it,
it gets a bit grubby, it gets rained on.
So it just needs constant upkeep
to making it look as nice as possible.
The emperor might turn up and not be very happy.
- [Jake] I cannot wait to get back to working here,
to get all the armour on,
to get in front of a crowd in particular.
It's one of the biggest cacophony
of sounds and sights and smells.
It's such a buzz.
- [Mark] We're all really keen to get back out there
and do it all again.
We are theatre people.
They want an audience to thrive and to bounce off of.
- [Lisa] Anyone would be lying if they said
they didn't get a little bit nervous
running up to the first show of the season again.
I am very much looking forward
to getting into competitions again.
It's a mixture of excitement and nerves, but good nerves.
- [Sarah-Jane] An item of clothing on like this,
like a uniform like this,
you carry yourself very differently.
Everything feels very different.
You stand prouder, you walk prouder.
- [Mark] I'm just hoping that I haven't
put on too much weight, because that's the one thing
that's a problem with armour is keeping the same.
- [Tom] On a warm day, it's not as nice,
but on a cold day this is really, really lovely.
But it does feel like an old friend, like it fits,
and you start to smile a bit more.
- [Jake] Very lovely miniskirt made out of mail.
We were wearing them first, ladies!
- [Sarah-Jane] Gas mask bag, that's essential.
You never know when it's needed.
- [Jake] You can feel that definitely
when you're in this stuff, you hold yourself different,
you speak to yourself different.
- You know, I can imagine myself
either in a damp part of Britannia
or the northern banks of the Rhine.
Oh, it feels good, it feels natural to me.
- [Lisa] If I walked down the street like this,
you'd probably turn heads a little bit.
- And then the badge of honour,
which I think you could tell looks spiffing.
I feel a bit of a fool in it, but that's the best thing.
Now I feel better.
- And, yeah, I think we're ready.
- [Jake] There we go. That's the whole thing.
- Right, time to go on duty then.
(tense string music)
(calm music)
- [Tom] People have their imagination,
but if you can colour it a bit more
people go home with these memories.
- [Jake] The live events at English Heritage
are some of the most fantastic things
because it just breeds this love of history.
- [Lisa] It's a privilege to be able to ride
on those same grounds that you know
there's been tournaments on previously.
- [Tom] When they come, they see the color,
the majesty, the music, the mirth.
- [Sarah-Jane] Really looking forward to interacting
with crowds, it's about people at the end of the day,
but we need to tell our stories to people.
And then once they're here, they just see
the splendour of it all.
(triumphant music)
(calm music)