Writer and performer Jamie-Lee Money talks new solo play ‘Spin Cycles’: “Grief isn’t always packaged in a clearcut way”

Following its original 2023 season, the show lands on the London stage for the first time, playing for a strictly limited run until the end of the week. Guillermo Nazara chats with the artist to learn more about her efforts to be on a roll.

How does it feel to be finally opening your show in London?

It certainly feels like a long time coming — I have been wanting to bring the show to London since our Fringe run in 2023, but with any new work, it is sometimes good to give the piece some breathing space before jumping headlong into future life. I think having time to reflect and rework the piece has definitely made it more clear and hopefully more enjoyable and relatable. I am really excited to be putting on the show at Camden People’s Theatre, it is such a great venue, and the theatre itself is such a cool black box space for independent work.

How did the idea for the piece come about?

I had been wanting to write a show and the cliché of ‘write what you know’ kept playing on my mind. In 2021, my grandfather passed away and my mum was diagnosed with breast cancer all within the space of 3 months. And so, I started to write down my ideas and observations as a bit of a cathartic release. Cut to August of 2022, my mum was given the all-clear and I continued to write and develop my ideas into what became our Fringe version in 2023.

Is life a spin cycle?

Certainly yes for Lolly in the play, and often for myself in real life. When life is happening around you and all you want to do is stop and take stock of some big life moments, it can feel a bit like you are tumbling inside the drum of a washing machine that starts to pick up to 1600rpm and shakes your kitchen into the flat below. Sometimes you just want your spin cycle to chill out.

Does the spin bike work as some sort of metaphor?

The spin bike becomes a place where Lolly can think about all of her suppressed emotions, and the loud moments on the bike in the class allow her to go to a quiet place and revisit some nostalgic moments. It becomes a place where she can experience 45 minutes of uninterrupted escape to try and figure things out. The spin class is not a cure, and it’s not a place where she gets over things, but it certainly helps her to feel like she can do hard things.

What themes have you intended to explore and why?

The show is a dark-comedy and merges the themes of grief, anxiety, changing body image, and memory, these themes are explored through light anecdotes and nostalgic stories. I find I am influenced by music when I write, which in turn evokes feelings of nostalgia and specific memories. I love tapping into a specific feeling that a song can give you. So often in my own life, I can remember the first time I ever heard a song, where I was and how it made me feel, so it’s amazing to connect to that.

Some of these realizations happen while Lolly is spinning on a spin bike; others happen while she is telling the audience about her experience. These are all things we think and feel when a big life-event forces us to turn our life upside down, and they can be hard to express, so I’ve tried to explore them in a truthful and sometimes unhinged way.

How proximate is this piece to your own personal reality?

The play is a semi-autobiographical exploration of my own personal experience — my mum did have breast cancer, and my grandfather and friend did both pass away over the last ten years, but Lolly is a bit of an alter ego and is definitely more irrational that I am in my day-to-day. She is reckless, restless, wild, detached, and definitely more cynical than I am. So it is fun to release myself fully and allow myself to be free in playing her with reckless abandon.

Is the fact that you’re performing the entire show on a spin bike an additional performative challenge?

I had always had an idea of how I wanted the show to work rhythmically with music and movement, but that changed instantly when we started working with the bike. It was a whole new feat for me trying to talk and spin, especially as an asthmatic, but we have dialed that up and down accordingly. I’m not so sure the audience is keen to watch me spin solidly for 70 minutes, so we have reworked and refined the show since it’s first iteration at Fringe and have really tried to get to the crux of what the story is about. I now spin on and off for a good 40 minutes of the show, and I am able to modulate my use of the bike to work with varying intensity throughout the piece.

What other challenges have you faced from both a creative and acting perspective?

It has been really hard to break into the industry in London as a pretty unknown performer from South Africa, but I have found that trying to see as much work as possible has been really inspiring, and it can then show you the kinds of people you would like to work with and the teams you would like to build. It really is all about who you know. And so, I am hoping to keep building a good foundation with the work I make and slowly break into the Industry here. Sometimes you just have to write yourself into existence which has been a sort of silver lining, because I have given myself permission to write more and explore the kinds of stories I would like to make and be in.

Are you trying to convey any message through this piece?

I guess the main message would be that grief is hard, weird, and funny, and it isn’t always packaged in a clearcut way. It looks very different depending on where you are and who you are grieving. My main take-away would be to give ourselves permission to feel and explore those emotions in whatever way works for you individually. Secondly, I think we should all be comfortable checking our boobs, you never quite know when a pesky lump the size of a grape could appear, and it’s better to know what your boobs feel like so you can get it sorted.

What are the prospects for the show after this initial short run?

We are hoping to take our show to New York, where Larica, the director, is based. I am also currently working on my debut TV-Pilot, and with some time and guidance, perhaps this might become a sardonic parable for the modern woman on screen.

Why come see ‘Spin Cycles’?

It’s a punchy-witty one-person take on grief in a relatable way. You’ll laugh, I’ll sweat, and we might all feel a bit of stinging behind the eyelids. It’s also great to support independent theatre makers and take yourself out to a show.

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Spin Cycles plays at Camden’s People Theatre until 7 February. Tickets are available on the following link.

By Guillermo Nazara