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Falling
****
Company(s): Poorboy, The Arches and NTS Workshop
Devised by Brian Ferguson and Sandy Thomson
Directed by Sandy Thomson
Dramaturg Davey Anderson
Producer Jacqui Skelton
Artists Lee Ann Cardle, Simon Conlon, Alex Cowles, Jake Stewart and David Stronach
Sound Design Ross Ramsay
Musicians Vicky Craig, Pete Phillips and Ross Ramsay
Lighting Design Ali Ross and Kenna Grant
Cast: Brian Ferguson, Carmen Pieraccini, Jamie Brotherston, Edward Corrie, Lesley Docherty, Terry Flyte, Jenny Hulse, Fergus Johnston, Emma Lambie, Seonaid MacDonald, Stuart Martin, Elaine McBride, Andy Root, Ashley Smith, Johnathan West and Jayne Wisener.
   
Dates & Times:
14 March - 15 April at 7.55pm. Meet the Angel at Queen Street Station.
More Info: www.poorboy.co.uk

Brian Ferguson in Poorboy

Impassioned, experiential theatre.

A newly devised site-specific piece by Poorboy, the Arches and the National Theatre of Scotland's Workshop initiative starts at Queen Street train station where audience members are met by an angel and provided with ticket and light stick. My imagination kicks into overdrive. I can be a terrible feardie at times and the prospect of being chased around Glasgow by demons or locked somewhere so dark I'll need a light does nothing for my nerves. Director Sandy Thomson and producer Jacqui Skelton assure us that we will be quite safe. While I'm deciding whether either of the two looks honest big Ginger bloke approaches with a fag in one hand, a holdall in the other and we're being led off into the night by some mad guy who thinks he's the devil. (Aaah, Mummy!)

With an audience of just ten, we are thoroughly outnumbered by our demonic cast as we are led from lost property office, through streets, pubs, underground and at one point bundled into a van. But our journey focuses on our guide, a delusional, violently passionate young man (Brian Ferguson) with a pile of white-hoodied angel enemies and a need for the allegedly redemptive qualities that he thinks only one young girl (Carmen Pieraccini) can provide.

This at no point seems like a polished, finished piece of theatre, and that is the appeal. The setting for this piece and the devised, under-rehearsed quality leaves an audience with a familiar environment turned strange and some incredibly heated, impressive acting from the devilish Ferguson and the young girl he pursues.

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Review © Mhari Hetherington, March 2006