Darwin’s Cleaner
Darwin's Cleaner is a one-woman play written and directed by Saskia Wesnigk-Wood,which debuted at the 2025 Brighton Fringe. It stars Olivia Post as Henrietta "Hen" Brown, a servant born on the same day as Charles Darwin (February 12, 1809), exploring themes of class, gender, and the hidden voices in history.
"This is quietly groundbreaking work... Olivia Post is both enormously affecting as Henrietta ‘Hen’ Brown and a shapeshifting narrator" - Brighton Fringe Review
For this thought provoking piece, playwright Saskia Wesnigk invented a woman from the 19th century – a servant, who would not have been documented at all except for the extraordinary circumstances into which she was born. In February 1809 the cook has a daughter – Hen, but on the same day in the same house is born a boy: the extraordinary Charles Darwin! Their lives become entwined.
We meet Hen when she has had enough of the mess and the carcasses, the flesh eating plants and the pinned butterflies. A woman can only put up with so much, and life has thrown a lot at our resilient and loving Henrietta Brown. Watch Hen dishing the dirt on the Darwins, and finding her own way as the world for Victorian women begins to change.
"This is quietly groundbreaking work... Olivia Post is both enormously affecting as Henrietta ‘Hen’ Brown and a shapeshifting narrator" - Brighton Fringe Review
For this thought provoking piece, playwright Saskia Wesnigk invented a woman from the 19th century – a servant, who would not have been documented at all except for the extraordinary circumstances into which she was born. In February 1809 the cook has a daughter – Hen, but on the same day in the same house is born a boy: the extraordinary Charles Darwin! Their lives become entwined.
We meet Hen when she has had enough of the mess and the carcasses, the flesh eating plants and the pinned butterflies. A woman can only put up with so much, and life has thrown a lot at our resilient and loving Henrietta Brown. Watch Hen dishing the dirt on the Darwins, and finding her own way as the world for Victorian women begins to change.
