IT is a dramatic season marked by new versions of powerful works by Scottish women writers: and the looming prospect of Brexit.
The 2019 season of the National Theatre of Scotland is to stage a series of plays on the night of Brexit, March 29, as well as new adaptations of lauded works by the national poet or Makar, Jackie Kay, and writer Jenni Fagan.
A season with 20 productions in 37 locations will see a new vision of The Panopticon, Fagan’s acclaimed novel, as well as the first stage version of Red Dust Road, Kay’s bestselling memoir, which will also be part of the Edinburgh International Festival.
Thank You Very Much, by Claire Cunningham, will see the phenomenon of Elvis impersonators explored with a cast of disabled performers, and it will be part of the Manchester International Festival in July, and will tour in October and November.
Dear Europe, which will be staged at Glasgow’s SWG3 venue, will feature theatrical takes on Brexit from a series of writers including NVA’s Angus Farquhar: in Cultural Capital, he will write to the heads of every EU state asking to be legally adopted as a new citizen.
Interference will be another work, a “bold and chilling” trilogy of plays set in the future, by Morna Pearson, Hannah Khalil and Vlad Butucea, directed by Cora Bissett - it will be performed in a Glasgow office block.
READ MORE: How Jackie Wylie outlined vision for NTS
Fagan’s Panopticon acclaimed debut, which tells the story of Anais Hendricks, 15, and her life and experiences of institutions and care, is also being adapted for a film.
Jackie Wylie, artistic director of the National Theatre of Scotland, said: “We are lucky in Scotland to have these powerful women, and it’s great to be able to provide them with a platform.
“They are brilliant works that we wanted to put on the stage - and of course there is something in the air at the moment, which is around a re-thinking around the dynamics of gender, so that is in everyone’s mind - so it is us taking an opportunity to look at the brilliant work of women in a particular moment in time.”
On Dear Europe, Ms Wylie said: “I really believe that culture has a role in igniting conversation, and a national company has a role in catalysing nationwide debate, and it will always have that role - it’s important to have a conversation about Europe, regardless of Brexit.
“We have asked those artists to do is look at five countries which have the greatest [European] populations in Scotland: Poland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia and Germany.
“It will be an opportunity to come together on the night, to be together. Whatever side of the debate you are on, people are going to have strong emotions about it.”
READ MORE: The Herald acclaims The Panopticon
She said the works will inspire feelings of “anger, nostalgia, relief, bereavement and love.”
Red Dust Road will premiere at the Edinburgh International Festival, has been adapted for the stage by Tanika Gupta, and will be directed by Dawn Walton: it’s cast has yet to be announced.
Red Dust Road was published in 2010, and the book won the Scottish Book of the Year Award in 2011.
One touring show will be John McGrath’s seminal play The Cheviot, the Stag and the Black, Black Oil.
With a collapsible set inspired by John Byrne’s original, it will tour smaller venue throughout Scotland, as the original production did in 1973.
Other productions on the schedule include Them!, written by Pamela Carter with Stewart Laing, who is directing his first show as associate director, and it will be staged in the Tramway in Glasgow in June and July next year.
Another show will be Total Immediate Collective Imminent Terrestrial Salvation, written by Tim Crouch and directed by Karl James and Andy Smith.
The NTS said the work explores “manipulation and the nature of truth in an age of arch-political misdirection.”
READ MORE: The last tour of The Cheviot, The Stag and the Black, Black Oil
Another show, The Drift by performer and spoken-word artist Hannah Lavery journeys “through history, Scottishness, belonging, and grief, exploring her legacy of being ‘mixed’ in Scotland.”
It will tour Scotland as part of Black History Month 2019.
Other projects include Like Flying, a participatory project with SAMH, (Scottish Association for Mental Health).
The project, "tackling mental wellbeing through aerial performance" will be performed in schools in East Ayrshire and Edinburgh in June.
A production of Adam, directed by Cora Bissett and written by Frances Poet, performed by Adam Kashmiry and Rehenna MacDonald, will tour to New York from 14 to 16 February, while Première neige/First Snow will tour to Canada.
Anything That Gives Off Light will visit Virginia, Kentucky, and New York from 01 to 30 March 2019.
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