David Benson's One Man Show to Mark the Bicentenary of the Cato Street Conspiracy

David Benson's One Man Show: Cato Street 1820
David Benson
David Benson's One Man Show Give Me Death or Liberty
David Benson's One Man Show to mark the bicentenary of the Cato Street Conspiracy

To mark the 200th anniversary of the Cato Street Plot of 1820, actor David Benson performed several performances of a one man show he had written on the subject. It was first performed at the Edinburgh Fringe in August 2019 and was performed at the Harrowby and District Resident’s Association Festival to mark the bicentenary on Sunday 23rd February 2020.

Cato Street 1820 is David Benson’s account of the events of February 23rd 1820.  Asa David puts it:

‘This was a plot to behead the entire cabinet of Lord Liverpool and declare a People’s government by a band of radical ne’er-do-wells. Or so the official story went. The show features many gems from my research sessions at the British Library over four years, during which our own era saw many profound changes and challenges to the relationship between People and Power. My special pride is to bring back from the dead a song, Oh Give Me Death or Liberty, a stirring anthem of revolution, screamed from the scaffold by one of the plotters moments before he was hanged, well-known to everyone in the vast crowd but totally forgotten today – until now!

With musical arrangements specially recorded by leading television and film composer Phillip Guyler – plus one song with accompaniment by Russian virtuoso accordionist Igor Outkine and wife Sarah Harrison (Mazaika) – Cato Street 1820 connects you intimately with the people who lived in London two hundred years ago.
This recording was made on Sunday February 23rd 2020 at a special performance organised by Caroline Friedman of the Harrowby and District Residents Association. Although David had performed the show at many other venues, this was the most poignant as it was in the basement of the Duke of York pub on Harrowby Street, yards from where stable on Cato Street where the plotters met on the night of 23rd February 1820.
More details are on David Benson’s Facebook page:

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