Listings: 1-8 Oct. 2017
On Edinburgh’s Stages this week…
It’s a packed week for lovers of theatre of all kinds, with a strong mixture of local companies and touring productions in town.
The event of the week has to be at the Traverse, which is co-producing Grid Iron’s latest: Jury Play, an immersive piece set in a courtroom. However the event of the month could well be the Lyceum’s Cockpit, which uses the whole theatre as an immersive set and has its first previews on Friday and Saturday before opening next week.
Ria Jones as Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard Pic: Manuel Harlan
Glasgow-based Rapture Theatre’s A Streetcar Named Desire, which arrives at the King’s at the end of its tour, has been splitting the critics, but has some interesting elements of colour-blind casting.
On the musical theatre front the big name is the arrival of the Curve Theatre’s production of Lloyd Webber’s Sunset Boulevard at the Playhouse with Ria Jones and Danny Mac.
A stunning treat, no doubt, but those who see Sunshine Ghost at the Studio have the chance to be in at the start of something new, with storyteller Andy Cannon joining forces with composer Richard Ferguson for a sparkling new musical.
For those who like their lunchtime theatre, this is a red-letter week with the return of A Play, A Pie and A Pint to the Traverse for a five week run of shows. The opener is Rob Drummond’s latest, Pleading, “a remarkable modern morality play” according to the Herald.
There are a couple of script-in-hand performances as well. At the Traverse the Thrawn Craws have an evening of four new works examining the meaning of love in modern Scotland, while the Storytelling Centre has Annvile Martin Travers’s adaptation of The Flourish byHeather Spears.
And finally the Assembly Roxy has a couple of interesting events. Alan Bisset’s The Ching Room has two performances, while Phil Hardie brings back his dance/circus crossover, Welcome My Son, in a new re-working of his 2015 version, before taking it out on a mini-tour.
Listings for Sunday 1 to Sunday 8 October 2017
For next week’s listings look here: On Stage Next Week.
The following week’s listings are here: On stage the following week.
Click on the name of the show to go to its ticketing site.
Assembly Roxy
2 Roxburgh Place, EH8 9SU
The Ching Room
Thursday 5 & Saturday 7 October 2017.
Evenings: 7.30pm.
A poet rushes into a toilet cubicle in a Sauchiehall Street nightclub only to find it occupied by Darren, who is not so much a drug-dealer as a high priest of the religion of cocaine-induced euphoria.
Welcome My Son
Saturday 7 October 2017.
Evenings: 7.30pm.
A unique interpretation of Frankenstein; as told through the monsters’ eyes. The piece explores themes of isolation, loneliness, conformity and prejudice, themes that are just as culturally and politically relevant as they were 200 years ago.
King’s Theatre
2 Leven Street EH3 9LQ. Phone booking: 0131 529 6000
Streetcar Named Desire
Tue 3 to Sat 7 October
Rapture Theatre, presents a sultry new production of an iconic theatrical classic. Fading southern rose: Blanche DuBois, seeks solace with Stella, her sister, after her world crumbles. But her downward spiral brings her face-to-face with Stella’s husband: the brutal, unforgiving Stanley Kowalski. Æ review: ★★☆☆☆ Underwhelming.
Lyceum Theatre
Grindlay Street EH3 9AX. Phone booking: 0131 248 4848
Cockpit
Fri 6 – Sat 28 Oct.
Previews: Fri 6, Sat 7, Mon 9.
Tue – Sat: 7.30pm; Matinees Weds, Sat: 2pm.
Enter the foyer of the Lyceum in 2017 – but take your seats in Germany, 1945 in a provincial playhouse being used as a makeshift transit camp for displaced persons from across the continent. The whole theatre becomes a stage and all of Europe the actors in this revival of Bridget Boland’s explosive 1947 drama.
Playhouse
18 – 22 Greenside Place, EH1 3AA. Phone booking: 0844 871 3014
Sunset Boulevard
Tue 3 – Sat 7 Oct.
Evenings: 7.30pm; Matinees: Wed, Sat: 2.30pm.
In her mansion on Sunset Boulevard, faded silent-screen goddess, Norma Desmond (Ria Jones), lives in a fantasy world. Impoverished screen writer, Joe Gillis (Danny Mac), on the run from debt collectors, stumbles into her reclusive world. The Curve production of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Tony Award-winning adaptation. Æ review: ★★★★★ Triumphant.
Scottish Storytelling Centre
Netherbow Theatre, 43-45 High Street, EH1 1SR Box Office: 0131 556 9579
Antigone
Monday 2 – Wednesday 4 October.
Evenings: 8pm.
Antigone buries her brother in defiance of Creon’s decree, but can the children of Oedipus ever break free of the curse of their father’s sins? Directed by John Mitchell. Presented Oxygen House in association with Acting Out Drama School.
Annville
Saturday 7 October.
Afternoon only: 1pm.
In November 1883 Scotland’s greatest untold tragedy reached its bloody conclusion at Annville house. A man with his jugular vein severed lies dead in the scullery. Two women inching towards the gate bleeding to death. This is the tale of how that wickedness came to pass. A rehearsed reading of Martin Travers’s adaptation of The Flourish byHeather Spears.
The Studio at Festival Theatre
22 Potterrow, EH8 9BL. Phone booking: 0131 529 6000
The Sunshine Ghost
Thurs 5 – Sat 7 Oct.
Evenings: 7.30pm (Preview Thurs)
A new musical from Andy Cannon and Richard Ferguson, directed by Ken Alexander. The Sunshine Ghost tells the comic tqle of the acquisition of Castle MacKinnon by a love-struck billionaire. Brought brick by brick from a remote rocky outcrop on a small Scottish Island all the way to Florida, they soon discover that the castle’s previous owner has not quite ‘left’ the building…
Traverse
10 Cambridge Street, EH1 2ED. Phone booking: 0131 228 1404
PPP: Pleading
Tue 3 – Sat 7 October 2017
Lunchtimes: 1pm, evening performance Friday 6 only: 7pm.
Freya and Michael have been travelling around the world, celebrating their freedom before University. Everything had been going reasonably well, until they are arrested at customs. Now they find out the choices they face; pleading guilty or innocent. Æ review: ★★★★☆ Tensely human.
Jury Play
Tue 3 – Sat 7 October 2017.
Evenings: 8pm.
Inspired by the pioneering work of Dr Jenny Scott, this immersive co-production from Grid Iron and the Traverse transforms Traverse 1 into a courtroom where barriers are deconstructed and jurors take centre stage. Peter the Judge is disaffected. For years he has watched as the jurors struggled with understanding the complexities of evidence and cross-examination. Maybe it’s time for a change, for an experiment in democracy.
Thrawn Craws: A Brief Archaeology of Love
Wed 4 October 2017.
Evening: 8pm.
Who do we love? How do we love? Does it shift as we age? The Ancient Greeks counted at least seven kinds of love, not restricted to romantic love. The Thrawn Craws (writers Grace Cleary, Ellie Stewart, Sarah Gudgeon and Sylvia Dow) examine what that looks like in Scotland today, with four script-in-hand readings. Part of Luminate.
ENDS
