Tron Theatre

Glasgow

19th – 23rd April 2016

Script:  Stagecraft:   Performance:

The fragility and contrastingly robust attitude of many different gods (group of drunks ) are under the microscope in this collection of interviews adapted for theatre. Not theatre for the faint hearted- it is what it is, a mass confession of all the capers, tragedies, stupidity, self hatred, loss and illusion that most recovering / or not alcoholics have to face and forgive.

This is tackled head on : no pussy-footing around the gay encounter gone wrong, no amount of microwaving or oven drying the piss saturated jeans of an alcoholic will ever lead to getting laid when he has almost set his hearts desire’s house alight melting his linoleum with his chargrilled remnants in the process. Stories to write blues tunes to. You couldn’t make this stuff up… if it wasn’t so real it would be funny. But that’s what’s so cool about this, it is funny. Although we might not directly relate to peeing from the top of Edinburgh’s Scott Monument we can visualise it easily enough. We are struck by the vulnerabilities and craziness excessive drinking provides, the sheer boredom that sobriety brings and the difficulty not so much in stopping but in staying stopped. Three female performers( Camille Marmie, Miriam Sarah Doren and Beth Kovarik) and two male (Ben Clifford and Mark Jeary) take us on a roller-coaster ride of scenarios that was recorded by writer/performer Mark Jeary.

Minimalist producer Callum Smith who leads Showroom, a platform for independent artists and small companies, has trumped the excellent How You Gonna Live Your Dash which was performed at the CCA in January this year.

Director/Designer Paul Brotherston who worked as Assistant Director in The Citizens Lanark: A  Life in three Acts brings out the best in the already superb cast who between them have performed in television series Outlander, Oran Mor’s A Play, A pie and A pint and Bard in the Botanics. Accomplished Lighting Designer Simon Hayes ( Enchanted Forest in Pitlochry ) illuminates what proves to be challenging and riveting contemporary theatre that pushes boundaries re-humanising and re-dignifying our otherwise objectification of the common drunk.

Reviewer : Clare Crines