The Nico Project

Legendary “underground” sixties icon Nico has captivated artists for decades and the new show The Nico Project, performed and co created by English actress Maxine Peake (better known as barrister Martha Costello in the BBC legal drama Silk and or as Veronica Bell in Shameless), along with director Sarah Frankcom, is an art-theatre-actor performance that includes an all female youth orchestra.

Maxine Peake has created an absorbing character study this mysterious, lanky, dark mysterious figure, once known as Christa Päffgen. Born in Cologne, she lived in Peake’s hometown of Manchester, when touring in the eighties until her accidental death in 1988. Further similarities between Peake and Nico, including both being brought up by single parents and grandparents, appear to have inspired Peake’s interpretation.

An allusive figure, Nico began her career as a fashion model, was a fifties “it” girl in Europe, moved to New York in the sixties in search of something outside of the Euro-glitterati, landed smack bang in New York and the Andy Warhol factory, and launched her singing career with the Velvet Underground. But it is her signature deep drone Germanic voice that carved her career as a progressive-gothic-art rock singer.

Peake walks on stage, her head bowed down, pulls at the microphone cord, appears uncertain, self-conscious - the house lights stay on, we the audience are experiencing a simulated studio recording session of her third album, “Marble Index” (1968). Her one time lover John Cale (Velvet Underground) was instrumental in shaping her early musical career. Peake omits his influence as a key player and drives the Nico mystique into unchartered territories, focusing on the aloof temperament of her artistic spirit.

Peake speaks as herself (in her English accent), also on a quest. She is at the station, she tells us, her dialogue interspersed with her Nico persona - singing in a Germanic accent – “Frozen Warnings”, “Lawn of Dawns”, “No One Is There”. Her orchestra, including Nico’s favoured instrument, the harmonium, is subtly meshed into the overall performance, despite being unfavorably dressed in Nazi Youth attire (referencing Nico’s Nazi soldier father).

The Nico Project is a cathartic art performance, and a whimsical exploration of a unique artist by a superb actor.

Flora Georgiou

Photographer: Joseph Lynn