Animate Lands: A Celtic Myth Cycle
★★★★☆ Traditional
Scottish Storytelling Centre (Venue 30): Mon 12 – Mon 26 August 2024
Review by Marion Geoffray
After selling out the Scottish Storytelling Centre in 2023, Animate Lands: A Celtic Myth Cycle returns to the venue for the Fringe. Storyteller Dougie Mackay accompanied by multi-instrumentalist Freya Rae, takes us on a poetic journey through traditional Scottish tales and wilderness.
An engaging tune on a fiddle and a smiley face greet us as we take our seat in the auditorium. A Scottish landscape is projected on a screen, while a representation of a deer on an easel sets the tone for what’s to come.
Dougie Mackay and Freya Rae in Animate Lands.
Breaking the fourth wall straightaway, Mackay invites us to reflect on why old tales matter now. He goes on with some light audience participation to define key themes and characters, defying the dangers of over-zealous audience members.
Mackay is a skilled performer though, and while he welcomes the interactions with humour, he knows how to captivate an audience at the tip of his tongue.
Ancient Celtic stories filled with druids, shapeshifters, sacred deer and warriors emerge. Rae’s animated score aptly enhances and punctuates Mackay’s delivery with sound effects and heartfelt melodies.
resonate
Mackay’s clever references to modern times add to these tales of love and loss, knowledge and ignorance, youth and maturity; ensuring that they resonate closer to home than one might have expected.
The show culminates with the end of the myth cycle echoing the cycle of life, when one terminates, another one begins. It subtly highlights our need to remember that, sometimes, solutions to our contemporary problems can be found in thousand years old fables.
By involving audience members in the storytelling, Mackay and Rae keep the narrative alive and succeed in putting a refreshing spin on an old artform.
Running time: One hour (no interval)
Scottish Storytelling Centre, (Netherbow theatre), 43-45 High Street, EH1 1SR (Venue 30)
Monday 12 – Monday 26 August 2024
Even dates only: 1.15pm
Details and tickets at: Book here
Website: http://storyconnection.org
Facebook: @storyconnectionDM
Instagram: @dougie.mackay.story
Linktree: @dougiemackay
Dougie Mackay and Freya Rae in Animate Lands.
ENDS
