| Review by Lisa Bennie, September 2006
Just Joan writing for the Daily Record, Scotland’s biggest or second biggest selling newspaper depending on what day of the week it is or who you ask, is there to help with the whole country’s problems. Agony Aunt supreme she rights our wrongs, answers our questions and gives us advice on love, life and relationships. Thousands of years of evolution and civilised society and we still can’t seem to get things right for ourselves. But if you think your relatioships are bad, just wait til you learn all about Julie’s.
Based on August Strindberg’s 1888 play Miss Julie, we are transported to mid-1920s Scotland and a time of unrest between two great wars. It’s midsummer’s-eve and the Master’s mill workers have been striking for nine weeks, but are celebrating with a dance. Amongst the heat and sweat Julie, the Master’s daughter, and John, his favourite butler, unearth their hidden emotions for each other and succumb to an affair which questions their emotions, class, politics and family.
By the National Theatre of Scotlands Ensemble Julie, along with Mancub by Douglas Maxwell and Gobbo and the Watchmaker by Davig Greig and Wils Wilson, is touring for two months around Scotland in the hope to bring some of its home-grown and based writing talent in to the areas often overlooked by such tours. Julie offers the chance for Scots people to see a work based on a classic play, but told in their own tongue and in their own background. As well as being a high-energy piece, full of subtleties in emotion performed by an excellent trio of actors, this captures the essence of the differing Scots mentalities. There are those who will plough on and never complain because that is best, and there are those that dream for a future where class is extraneous and every man can have his time. Still a relevant mantra today with the divide as great as ever between the city and suburbs folk, or rich and poor, it’s an inward look at the population divide we have inherited. In the round this performance highlights the claustrophobia of small town expectations and gossip and the set radiates a midsummer heat cooled only by the piped in water. In touring these productions will hopefully be a success, bridging the divide, a reminder that theatre is for everyone, much like the Record.
National Theatre of Scotland Ensemble
Touring 24th August – 25th October
North Edinburgh Arts Centre
08/09/2006 - 08/09/2006
Platform at the Bridge, Glasgow
28/08/2006 - 04/09/2006
Ballachulish Village Hall
12/09/2006 - 12/09/2006
MacPhail Centre, Ullapool
15/09/2006 - 15/09/2006
Sabhal Mor Ostaig
19/09/2006 - 19/09/2006
Victoria Hall, Cromarty
24/09/2006 - 24/09/2006
Thurso High School
28/09/2006 - 28/09/2006
Craigmonie Centre, Drumnadrochit
30/09/2006 - 30/09/2006
Bettridge Centre, Newtonhill
03/10/2006 - 06/10/2006
New Deer Public Hall
07/10/2006 - 07/10/2006
Tullynessle & Forbes Village Hall, Alford
11/10/2006 - 11/10/2006
The Fisherman's Hall, Buckie
13/10/2006 - 13/10/2006
Kirkcowan Village Hall, Galloway
18/10/2006 - 18/10/2006
Middlebie Village Hall, Dumfriesshire
21/10/2006 - 21/10/2006
Sanquhar Town Hall
24/10/2006 - 24/10/2006
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