An American Love Letter to Edinburgh
★★★★☆ Enchantingly Earnest
Scottish Storytelling Centre (Venue #30): Thurs 1 – Sun 25 August 2024
Review by Cyril Langston
Equipped only with a book and a glass of water, storyteller Rick Conte masterfully intertwines the true tales of two Edinburgh visitors separated by nearly 250 years in An American Love Letter to Edinburgh at the Scottish Storytelling Centre.
This story, with direction by Andy Cannon, is truly a love letter, but not only to Edinburgh – also to youth, to wonder, and to history.
Rick Conte in An American Love Letter to Edinburgh. Pic: Sandy Butler
Conte winds us through his life, starting early in his childhood. He recounts his experience as a young Southern boy from Georgia heading off to experience for himself some of that much-lauded European Culture so touted in American media as a right of passage for adventurous 20-somethings unsure of their next steps.
After failing to find what he was looking for in London, he heads to Edinburgh at the recommendation of a friendly bartender and finds himself smitten.
Through the recounting of his own experience Conte slowly weaves in the tale of Benjamin Franklin’s visits to Edinburgh in the height of the Scottish Enlightenment, when he too fell in love with the city and its people.
Benjamin Franklin’s story becomes, unobtrusively and gratifyingly, the guiding structure for Conte’s own reflection on his experiences. The two stand in the same places, meet versions of the same people, become overcome by the same emotions — and the overwhelming sense is that either of them could easily be any of us.
loving tableau
Conte’s earnest retelling of his own journey paints a loving tableau of the starry-eyed first-time visitor to Edinburgh who many of us have met or ourselves once were. He loves The Proclaimers but has always wondered what a “Leith” is; he only understands about a third of what his Glaswegian girlfriend says; he wonders why it feels like every pub happens to host theatre in August.
This intoxicating earnestness transforms the story into a loving ode to innocence, naivete, and youthful wonder – rather than the easier and more called-upon narrative of the annoying tourist, purposefully obtuse.
Conte is an expert storyteller. In one hour he manages to capture the elusive enchantment that centuries of people caught up in Edinburgh’s love story have attempted to pinpoint.
Buoyed by his rhythmic southern drawl and ease on the stage, viewers of An American Love Letter to Edinburgh will be reminded how remarkable this city is; how lucky we are to be here, and how much connects us to one another.
Running time: One hour (no interval)
Scottish Storytelling Centre (Netherbow Theatre), 43-45 High Street, EH1 1SR (Venue 30)
Thursday 1 – Sunday 25 August 2024
Odd dates only: 1.15pm
Details and tickets at: Book here
Website: https://rickcontecom.wordpress.com
Facebook: @The Scientific Romance Theatre Company
ENDS
I was fortunate enough to see / hear the first American reading of this in Alpharetta GA in Sept. 2023 we highly recommend taking an hour to be a part of this its fun and entertaining. Good job Rick