Scotland Archives - North West End UK

2May

By Wendy McEwanNo Comments

Scotland

Shotgunned – Traverse Theatre

Roz (Lorna Panton) packs up the belongings of Dylan (Fraser Allan Hogg), her ex. She hesitates, then adds one last item, a cheerful framed painting of the name Olivia. We see the tenderness, and the anger, that Roz and Dylan hold for each other. The story of their romance is told nonsequentially. These are the familiar, everyday moments of life, as two young people in love laugh and cry together. Their first awkward conversation. Dylan teaching Roz how to play on the Xbox. Sharing their hopes and dreams for the life they will build together. It all falls apart after Roz suffers a miscarriage. The grief for their daughter, Olivia, is too much to bear. The story is simple, and Matt Anderson’s script is very much character driven. He has provided some lovely ...

The Ballad of Johnny and June – Festival Theatre

1May

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

The Ballad of Johnny and June – Festival Theatre

There is a problem with telling a story everyone already knows. This story of Johnny and June understands the problem well enough, but the script never really finds an alternative solution. Instead, the music is left to speak for itself. The show opens with Jackson, the quintessential Johnny and June number, a confident, toe tapping start that promises energy and momentum. From there, the narrative is framed largely through the eyes of their son, John Carter Cash, offering a lens that suggests memory, subjectivity, and, crucially, that truth is never singular. When Johnny first meets June at the Ryman Auditorium and declares, with typical bravado, that he will one day marry her, we are reminded that this is only his version of events. It is a useful idea, that truth shifts depending on ...

1May

By Jessie MartinNo Comments

Scotland

Tomorrow – Traverse Theatre

Hereford based dance company, 2Faced held the Scottish premiere of Tomorrow at The Traverse this week. Directed and choreographed by Tamsin Fitzgerald and devised with dancers Lew Baker and Sam Buswell, Tomorrow is a striking portrayal of men’s mental health displayed using contemporary dance. This show was devised in collaboration with Mind, a charity dedicated to providing mental health support for anyone who needs it across England and Wales. 2Faced partnered with Mind to create Men in Motion - a dance class specifically for men struggling with mental health issues. It was through this group’s sharing of their lived experiences, as well as the performers own experiences of mental health that Tomorrow was devised from. Fitzgerald’s direction is raw and in your face -...

Much Ado about Nothing – Augustine United Church

26Apr

By Wendy McEwanNo Comments

Scotland

Much Ado about Nothing – Augustine United Church

There are pranks aplenty in the Edinburgh Rep Company’s production of Much Ado About Nothing – only some of which are benevolent. Benedick (Declan Jennow) and Beatrice (Beth Eltringham) have one thing in common: they never want to get married, and they are particularly horrified at the suggestion that they might marry each other. They both talk about this a lot. They are clearly destined to be together; their friends just have to help them break the ice. Meanwhile, the wicked Don John (a softly spoken Colby Scott) is scheming and plotting. Hero (Erin Frances Spiers) walks beaming down the aisle (we are in an actual church, after all) arm-in-arm with her proud father Leonato (Kyle Paton). But Don John has framed her as a wicked harlot! Her fiancé Claudio (Patrick Foxwell) sl...

Jack Docherty in The Chief: No Apologies – Traverse Theatre

23Apr

By Roger JacobsNo Comments

Scotland

Jack Docherty in The Chief: No Apologies – Traverse Theatre

Jack Docherty has had a much longer, and varied, career than many may be aware of. Having started at the Fringe in his home town of Edinburgh in 1980, he’s been on stage, in front of and behind the camera and as a writer for such legendary TV shows as Alas Smith & Jones, Spitting Image, Vic Reeves and Lenny Henry. Heck, he even had a chat show on Channel Five for a year or so in the late 90’s. But it’s Chief Commissioner Cameron Miekelson (from Scot Squad) that’s finally given him his oeuvre and the opportunity to roam unrestrained across any subject he cares to choose. Tonight’s very much like a stand-up routine but in two acts, with an interval. He’s written a book, ‘The Chief: No Apologies’ and treats us to excerpts, ‘treats’ being the operative word for we are privileged to be t...

The Spy Who Came in from The Cold – Edinburgh Festival Theatre

23Apr

By Roger JacobsNo Comments

Scotland

The Spy Who Came in from The Cold – Edinburgh Festival Theatre

One of the predominant elements of John Le Carré’s novels concerning British Intelligence is bleakness. A mantle of washed-out grey cloaks the lives and actions of his characters, darker shades representing the shadows in which they are doomed to operate. As his son Nick Harkaway writes in the programme (in contrast with another, cinematically celebrated, agent of ‘the service’) there’s ‘not a martini or an Aston Martin in sight.’ The set (Max Jones) and lighting (Azusa Ono) for tonight’s show reflect this, the barbed-wire topped wall looming mute behind a floor displaying the contorted map of Europe in the early 60’s. The uniforms and attire of all concerned (with the exception of Liz Gold’s turquoise suit in the closing scenes) are relentlessly dour, and in Alec Leamas’s case, appr...

16Apr

By Dylan MooneyNo Comments

Scotland

What I’m Here For – Traverse Theatre

With an international exploration of the health care system, What I’m Here For stops at Edinburgh’s Traverse Theatre as part of its Scottish tour. From the collaborative minds of Vanishing Point, from our home soil, and Danish company, Teatre Katapult, this production draws a parallel to both countries' health and care infrastructure and the daily challenges faced by those working within it. We open on Flora (Lærke Schjærff Engelbrecht) smoking on the roof of a hospital. It is the end of her shift but before she goes home to rest, she begins to reflect on the working day that had just unfolded. Memories appear and disappear as Flora struggles to separate fact from fiction. With severe staffing issues and constant pressure in her working environment, Flora’s help is required all around t...

16Apr

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Gush – Traverse Theatre

There is something quietly exacting about a one person show. It is an island, really, a contained territory where there is nowhere to hide, no supporting architecture of cast to lean on. If it works, it approaches a kind of theatrical purity. If it does not, it is exposed within minutes. I admit, I am a sucker for the form.Gush, written by Jess Brodie and directed by Becky Hope Palmer, comes close to that sense of honed perfection.At its centre is a single performer, Jessica Hardwick, who carries the entire evening with considerable control and, at times, something approaching virtuosity. She moves deftly between roles, voices and emotional registers, and if there is a hierarchy within that, it is clear that her articulation of the female experience is where the piece truly finds its voice...

13Apr

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Shooglenifty – Traverse Theatre

There are evenings where the relationship between performance and space becomes the story, and this is one of them. I’m at the Traverse Theatre watching Shooglenifty, a band whose entire raison d’être is to get people on their feet, and I’m sitting in the second row of a steeply raked, all seated auditorium that is doing everything in its power to keep me there.Shooglenifty have been around since 1990, and they play like it, in the best possible way. The musical evolution of the ‘Niftys’ is best described as a fusion of traditional ceilidh rhythms with global influences including Asian, Middle Eastern and contemporary sounds into a vibrant danceable whole. This is a band completely at ease with itself, driving hard, playing tight, and clearly enjoying the room, even if the room isn’t quite...

8Apr

By Nazaret RaneaNo Comments

Scotland

The High Life – Festival Theatre

After spending the Easter weekend revisiting this quirky TV show, I was ready to immerse myself in the musical adaptation of The High Life, and I’ll admit I went in with a mixture of excitement and scepticism. It is one thing to love something in a nostalgic, half remembered way, and quite another to see it expanded into a full stage show. This feels less like a revival and more like a reunion that has been allowed to get slightly out of hand. From the outset, the production leans into its own chaos. The opening number arrives with a knowing wink, that familiar theme tune doing a lot of the work in terms of goodwill, but it quickly becomes clear that the show is not content to rely on recognition alone. It understands what made the original work and pushes it further rather than trying ...