Hackney People
Tony Robinson
TV presenter Tony Robinson is well-known for digging up the past in Channel 4’s Time Team show.
But it’s the future the Hackney-born actor is most interested in at the moment. And it’s one year in particular that has got him going – 2012.
“Hackney has always struggled because it hasn’t had the opportunities other boroughs have,” says the much-loved character who played Baldrick in cult comedy Blackadder, and the Sheriff of Nottingham in hit children’s show Maid Marion and Her Merry Men.
“That’s why what’s happening now is so exciting. I felt very despondent about my home borough for a long time. Various attempts have been made in my lifetime to make Hackney better for local people, but all of them have foundered. A lot of that was due to the poor transport network.”
But now the borough is to get a 21st century link to the Tube network, via the East London Line extension, due to open in 2010. Tony said:
“I think it will transform the borough. Hackney has so much more to offer the rest of London. Everything else will stem from the improved transport.”
He spoke to Hackney Today during a flying visit to the Marshes while shooting a film about the borough to celebrate the Olympic Handover on 24 August – when London becomes the official host for the 2012 Games.
It is clear Tony is passionate about Hackney, which he describes as ‘the real London’. His mum came from Dalston, and his dad lived in Mare Street. He was born at Homerton Hospital and moved to South Woodford when he was young.
But Tony was keen to come back as soon as he could, and moved into the old family home in Amhurst Road during his 20s, where he stayed for 15 years.
“Hackney is the good old East End,” he said. “My dad learnt all the old Cockney songs at the Hackney Empire, and taught them to me.
“Three hundred years’ of Robinsons have lived in Hackney and Tower Hamlets, and generations of my family are buried at Abney Park Cemetery.”
Like so many people who live in Hackney, his favourite thing about the borough is its diversity. “Because it has been diverse for so long,” he said. “People are used to absorbing new people. Of course there’s aggravation, but not nearly as much as in places where there isn’t the psychology of absorption.”
Despite having moved out of the borough some years ago, Tony still enjoys visiting, especially shopping at Ridley Road Market.
Back to the future and Tony’s tip for 2012 is to capture it all. “We should all get our cameras out now,” he added.
“Because the 2012 Games are going to bring so many positive changes.
“Hackney will now get millions of pounds worth of new investment. I never thought I’d hear that in my lifetime.”
More information
For East London Line details visit: the Transport in Hackney page.
Page updated: 15 Jun 2010
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