Oran Mor's new season of A Play, A Pie And A Pint promises to be as eclectic as ever.
Topics occupying centre stage over the coming months include an intrepid expedition to Antartica; a series of plays about the Arab world, co-produced with the National Theatre of Scotland; and a Jean -Jacques Rousseau inspired celebration of PPP's 250th production.
Getting proceedings up and running this week is trans-gender playwright Jo Clifford's Sex, Chips And The Holy Ghost. Clifford created a bit of a stooshie during Glasgay! a few years ago, with her portrayal of Jesus as a transsexual woman in Jesus, Queen Of Heaven. Here she once again turns her attention to matters of faith, religion, spirituality, morality and being true to oneself.
Breaking the fourth wall from the off, Clifford's nun and David Walsh's priest inform us that there will be no blasphemous play on show. Instead they are here to conduct a purifying exorcism on the audience as part of their entrepreneurial business, soulclean.com. At first the humour on show is reminiscent of Father Ted, but the play then slowly dovetails into a more philosophical look at matters moral and theological, such as the Vatican's underpinning of the banking system and the church's outdated attitudes to otherness (Clifford's nun has been outcast for being transsexual; Walshe's priest for being gay).
The end result is a patchwork polemic not lacking in celebrating the diversity of being human – but one with as many troughs as peaks.
As the season's opener however, it's a thought-provoking and entertaining start. Not sure about the homage-to-chips finale, right enough.
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