In celebration of VE Day, Age Uk Croydon has asked me to photograph Gerald.
Gerald worked as a performer during the war years helping his impresario father to stage productions designed to entertain and delight the beleaguered residents of East London.
After V.E. day these productions continued - “People thought life was going to go back to normal after the war but it didn’t. It forced people to examine what they were doing with their lives and say ‘What am I going to do now?’”
They still needed cheering up, and Gerald wasn’t going to let them down! Together with Anthony Newley no less Gerald took to the stage in London’s glittering West End entertaining hundreds of Londoners every night.
Would Gerald have envisaged himself being on the stage if WW2 hadn’t happened? Probably not. After the war “People were forced down certain channels…you had to take opportunities where they presented themselves and say do I grab them or not?”
We asked Gerald what his biggest piece of advice would be to me during this current crisis.
“Adapt,” he says, “And you haven’t lost your creative outlet – it is lying dormant.”
interview by Mark Collier