THEATRE LIST
0 Theatre is listed by city first, then by venue, running in alphabetical order, except for touring shows which are listed by the name of the show. Please send details not later than 10 days before publication date. Cabaret is listed separately.
GLASGOW
O CITIZENS Gorbals Street. 429 0022. Box Office Mon-Sat 10am—8pm. Bar.
Piaf Until Sat 28 March. 7.30pm. Sat 28 Mar. 4pm and 8pm. £3 Student
£1 ; OAP and unemployed £1 in advance. free on door. TAG Theatre Company revive their production of Pam Gems‘ moving play about the tragic life ofthe famous singer:
See Review.
0 CUMBERNAULD THEATRE Cumbernauld. 0236 732887. Box Office Mon—Fri 10am—6pm. Sat 10am—3pm. 6-8pm perfevgs. Bar/Cafe.
Hocus Focus and In Nomine Patris Fri 20andSat 21. 7.45pm. £2.75 (£1.50). Annexe Theatre Co in their successful double bill.
See Review.
High Places Thurs 26—Sat 28 Mar. 7.45pm. Thurs £2.50 (£1 .25); Fri and Sat£3 (£1.50). 7:84 Scotland in their new touring production ofa play by Ena Lamont Stewart about housing conditions. See Review.
Writer/director Jeremy Raison is currently on loan from the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh to Kirkcaldy College of Technology. He is combining his by no means small talents with those of the 25 Theatre Arts students at the college. The end result will be Blitz! which starts its two-week run at the Traverse on 24 March.
Twenty-six year-old Baison (whose most recent previous work was Savage Britannia, produced during last year’s Edinburgh Festival with considerable success, and again written and directed by him), spent the long winter months researching and writing the play especially for Kirkcaldy College. ‘It was very much written for the actors involved. I watched them quite a lot beforehand. Their course had very specific requirements, so I was faced with writing something with twenty-three fairly equal parts. The students are also doing virtually everything else— props, costume, building the set. They have a huge amount of enthusiasm and a considerable amount of talent.’
The connection between the Traverse and Kirkcaldy College is not as obscure as might be suspected, for the College have brought their shows from the
THEATRE
O KING’S Bath Street. Box Office Mon—Sat 12 noon—6pm. 4 bars. [D] [E] Phone Bookings, Ticket Centre, Candleriggs. Mon—Sat 10.30am—6.30pm. 552 5961.
Music Man Until Sat 21 March. 7.30pm. Sat mat 2.30pm. Tickets: Stalls. Mon—Sat £3.50. £3; Grand Circle Mon—Thurs £4.40. Fri and Sat £5; Upper Circle £2. The Pantheon Club in association with Biggars Music present a family musical
The Desert Song Mon 23—Sat 28 Mar. 7.30pm. Sat mat 2.30pm. £3.50, £2.50, £1 .50. Two for price ofone Mon. Concs half-price Mon—Fri. The Lyric Club in the musical.
My Fair Lady Mon 30 Mar—Sat 4 Apr. 7.30pm. Sat mat 2.30pm. Prices as for The Desert Song. Paisley Musical and Operatic Society in the popular musical version ofShaw's Pygmalion
O MITCHELL Granville Street, 221 3198. Box office Mon-Sat. 12 noon—6pm. Bar. Cafe. [D] Tickets also available from Ticket Centre. Candleriggs. 552 5961. Mon—Sat 10.30am—6.30pm.
High Places Until Sat 21 March. 7.30pm. £3.50 (£2). 7:84 Theatre Company in their new production of a play by Ena Lamont Stewart. See Touring and Review.
The Sash Mon 23-Sat 28 Mar. 7.30pm. £3 (£2.50). Two for price of
BLITZ!: EXPLORING NEW PREMISES
Scottish Student Drama Festival to the Traverse for the last two years.
The play itself tells of the experiences of a group of Clydebank schoolchildren who were evacuated to the countryside before the war. The children find themselves in an antagonistic co-existence with, as Raison describes it, ‘the posh locals.’ Social differences and a town-country opposition are explored as an uneasy truce comes into effect. Several stories run concurrently, which gives liaison the challenge of ‘fitting as many as possible of the cast on the small Traverse stage at once.‘ The choice of
one on Mon. Unit One Theatre Company in Hector MacMillan’s play about the Protestant-Catholic divide still very evident in Western Scotland. Cabaret Moir Hall. Fri 20 and Sat 21 Mar; Fri 27 and Sat 28 Mar. £3 (£1.50). Mitchell Theatre for Youth senior group in the famous musical based on Christopher lsherwood’s stories about Berlin of the Thirties. O PAVILION 121 Renfield Street, 332 1846. Box office Mon-Sat 10am—8pm. Bar. The Hobbitt Mon 23—Sat 28 Mar. Mon—Thurs 7.30pm. Tue, Wed, Thurs and Sat 2pm; Fri 10am and 2pm. £5. £4, £3.50. Theatre Royal Hanley in a musical adaptation of Tolkein‘s classic tale of Bilbo Baggins er a]. For ten to sixteen years. Steve King as Al Jolson Fri 27 and Sat 28 Mar. 7.30pm. £4, £3.50. £3. An Evening with Doris Collins Mon 30 Mar. 7.30pm. £5, £4.50. See Playhouse, Edinburgh. 0 THEATRE ROYAL Hope Street, 331 1234. Box office Mon—Sat _ 10am—6pm (7.30pm on perfevgs). Bar. Buffet. King Lear Until Sat 21 March. 7.15pm. £2.50—£8.50. Tue—Thurs OAPS, Children. Students, UB40s, wheelchair users, halfprice. Stand-by for conc. categories £2.50 from 6pm. Last chance to see Anthony Quayle on stage, as he leads his Compass Theatre Company in the title role ofShakespeare‘s masterpiece. See Review. Kiss Me Kate Thurs 2 Apr—Sat 11 Apr. 7.15pm. Also at 2. 15pm on Sat 4, Thurs 9 and Sat 11 Mar. £3—£12.50. Thurs mat two for price ofone. OAPS, Children. Students. UB40s, wheelchair users, £2 off
subject-matter came about because of
‘a fascination with the blitz. I think of the war as ancient history, but researching the play gave me the chance to hearof the experiences of those who lived through it. The Clydebank blitz has to date been neglected.’
Using the resources available to him, liaison has also tapped the inherent differences in his cast, thereby neatly side-stepping any problems that Glaswegian accent might have caused him: ‘Eight people in my cast are Glaswegian. I wanted to play off the fact that they were Glaswegian against the fact that a lot of them are from Kirkcaldy and other areas. But all idiom had to be carefully checked for verbal anachronisms.’
The project sits well in alliance with the Traverse’s policy of promoting new writing. In this case, new acting and backstage talent gets a chance as well. As liaison, in his assistant-director-of-the-Traverse hat points out, ‘on a grant that’s not big enough to put on enough shows, you have to find other ways of doing new plays, other ways of bringing new people in.’ (Kristina Woolnough)
evenings (except Fri and Sat); Half price Sat mats. Stand-by rate £3 from 6pm for all conc categories except wheelchair users. The Royal Shakespeare Company‘s much-acclaimed production of the Cole Porter musical. See next issue for Feature.
0 THIRD EYE CENTRE 350 Sauchiehall Street. 3327521.
The Wayward Princess Sat 21 and Sun 22 March. 1 lam and 2.30pm. £1 child, £2 adult. Primary Colours Theatre Co in a production for 5—12 year-olds about the rather liberated Princess Zoe. who goes in for none ofthis truck about marrying handsome suitors presented to her. The Sleeping Beauty Panto Thurs l9—Sat 21 Mar. 7.30pm. £2.50 (£1.50). Soor Plooms in a feminist parody of the trad panto.
O TRON THEATRE 63 Trongate. 552 4267/8. Box Office Tue—Sat Noon—8pm; Sun 12.30—8pm. Cafe/Rest. BarTue—Thurs
Noon—l 1pm; Fri and Sat Noon—midnight; Sun 12.30—11pm. Mugshot Until Sat 21 Mar. 8pm. £4 guests; £3 members (ofTraverse or Tron Theatres); £1 students. OAPS, Ub40s. disabled and under 21 (members). Cumbernauld Theatre Co in theirtouring Chandleresque spoofthriller.
See Review. The World Turned Upside Down Tue 24—Sun 29 Mar. 8pm. Prices as for Mugshot. An extraordinary one-man show in which Peter Cleall (best known as ‘Duffy‘ from the series Please Sir) plays eighteen characters as he tells the story ofa band ofpeasants known as the Diggers. Colette Tue 31 Mar—Sun 5 Apr. 8pm. Prices as for Mugshot. Bobok, a new Scottish theatre company. committed to producing new or neglected musical works. presents a production about the life of the famous. not to say infamous. French writer and actress Colette, telling her story entirely through song. WarZone Sat 21 Mar. 2.30pm. In the bar. Free. Playreading ofa new play by Stephen Moffat which comprises two debates on war. the first set around 1200. the second during the Second World War.
Bette Sat 28 Mar. 2.30pm. In the bar. Free. Playreading of a new play by Ken Ross — a sympathetic look at Myra Hyndley and what the press would do ifshe was released.
EDINBURGH
0 ADAM HOUSE Chambers Street. 225 3744.
Much Ado About Nothing Until Sat 21 Mar. 7.30pm. £2.50 (£2) (tickets available Usher Hall Box Office. 228 1155 in advance). Edinburgh Graduate Theatre Group in Shakespeare‘s comedy in which the witty Beatrice and Benedick meet their match in every sense.
0 ASSEMBLY ROOMS 54 George Street.
Focus on Dance Sun 22—Sun 29 Mar. See Dance listings.
Jotters Tue 31 Mar—Sat 4 Apr. 7.30pm. £3 (£2). Tickets available in advance from Usher Hall Box Office. Lothian Road.2281155.
16 The List 20 March — 2 April