Jemma Wayne and Rachel Sternberg talk to Nick Elvin about writing their debut play Negative Space

Stories about missing children are regularly in the headlines, but what happens when years have passed, the child has not been found and media attention surrounding their disappearance has died down?

Negative Space, which comes to Hampstead’s New End theatre next week is a play that looks at those who are left behind and the void that is left in their lives.

It is the first play written by friends Jemma Wayne and Rachel Sternberg, from north London.

“It began at a real tangent,” says Jemma. “One day we were talking about soldiers that had gone missing around the world and we imagined the sort of loneliness their families suffered. We didn’t want to politicise about various wars, so we looked for universal parallels. We began to look at the subject of missing children.”

The story is set ten years after the disappearance of an 11-year-old girl, and focuses on the grief, guilt, and unanswered questions that torment her family.

Rachel adds: “We found out that 100,000 children go missing in the UK every year. The media concentrates on whodunit and the hunt for clues, but we wanted to focus on those who are left behind. For them there’s a negative space where that person used to be.”

Directed by Tom Hunsinger, the play’s cast includes Russell Floyd (EastEnders, The Bill), April Pearson (Skins), Hannah Tointon (Hollyoaks) and Olivier Award winner Suzan Sylvester.

Jemma is the daughter of Jeff Wayne, perhaps best known for his 1978 musical version of the War of the Worlds. She grew up in Shenley and attended North London Collegiate School in Harrow, where she met Rachel when they were aged seven. Both agree that the school helped them to develop their imaginations and they often wrote together as pupils. After leaving the school at 18, they went on to Cambridge University.

Following a spell as a journalist Jemma, who now lives in Primrose Hill, decided to become a full-time writer. East Finchley resident Rachel has been an actress since graduating, and has also developed scripts, mainly for children to perform. She says working with Jemma is just as good in their late 20s as it was when they were at school. “It’s a huge amount of fun,” she adds. “It’s not really work.”

Negative Space is on at the New End Theatre, Hampstead, from Tuesday, September 15 to Sunday, October 11. Tickets: 0870 033 2733 or www.newendtheatre.co.uk (£20, £18 concs.).