Don’t be fooled by the sucker punch breeziness of the Superman styled promo images that accompany the National Theatre of Scotland’s staging of Damian Barr’s 2013 memoir. While there are laughs to be had, Barr’s look back at growing up gay in small town 1980s Scotland can be a pretty brutal ride at times.
Brought to life by Barr, co-writer James Ley and director Suba Das, we first meet DB celebrating his new commission with his husband Mark. But how to go about unearthing his personal remembrance of things past without avoiding the traumas that shaped him?
The only answer, as DB is advised, is to relive it all, however painful that may be.
This sends Barr on a trip that uses a similar sleight of hand to that used in TV fantasia, Ashes to Ashes, in which a retro kitsch setting is the backdrop for some very serious meditations on an era that had a lot more going on than its seeming revolt into style.
In designer Kenneth MacLeod’s hands, Barr’s world looks like a Spitting Image version of Narnia, where Gary Lamont’s DB watches over his younger self. As played by Sam Angell, Wee DB runs a gauntlet of playground homophobia and a brutal home life, all seen through the Thatcherite prism of the former Conservative Prime Minister’s destruction of industry and sanctioning of institutionalised prejudice. Over all this hangs the spectre of Maggie herself, with Beth Marshall channeling the spirit of the wicked witch of Westminster with arch ferocity.
All this is brought to life in a fearless and unflinching fashion in Das’ production, which takes its time to convey Barr’s mini series’ worth of storyline over its just shy of three-hour duration. In the end, as DB finally meets his deadline, the ghosts of his life are immortalised in print even as they have been laid to rest in a story that is as much about purging as liberation.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here