The Hub, Pacific Quay, Glasgow 4 stars There has probably never been a more relevant week to premiere a dramatic dissection of whatever’s left of the newspaper industry, and the National Theatre of Scotland’s eloquently realised cut-up of interviews with some forty-three main-stage players goes way beyond any fears of self-reflexive brow-beating. While it will never top last week’s events at the Leveson inquiry when both Rupert and James Murdoch were forced to account for both their own actions and the culture of newspapers they were in charge of, Enquirer nevertheless paints a thought-provoking and oddly poignant portrait of a bruised industry being dragged through its own mud. As the audience enter the tellingly unused top-floor open-plan office of a real life media hub, the piles of unsold newspapers used as seats as we’re promenaded from desk to desk are even more telling about the state we’re in. From morning conference to putting the paper to bed, the story, as related by a fantastic cast of six playing composites of journalistic archetypes, is one of a high-pressure industry in free-fall, whose practitioners, as one subject says, are regarded by the public as “second-class citizens”. Shaped by co-directors Vicky Featherstone and John Tiffany with co-editor Andrew O’Hagan from interviews conducted by veteran journalists Paul Flynn, Deborah Orr and Ruth Wishart, the meta-narrative of such a construction may be plain to see. The interviews depicted are vital, however, with John Bett’s study of Times editor Roger Alton a hilarious counterpoint to Billy Riddoch as former Scottish Sun editor Jack Irvine and Maureen Beattie’s heartbreaking study of war reporter Ros Wynne-Jones. This is documentary theatre at its devastatingly incisive best. And that’s on the record. The Herald, April 30th 2012 ends
Edinburgh Playhouse Five stars A big National Coal Board sign looms large at the opening of Lee Hall and Elton John's decade-old musical stage version of Hall and director Stephen Daldry's hit turn of the century film. In a tale of one little boy's liberation as a dancer against the backdrop of the 1980s miners strike, however, the Durham Miners banner and the 'Save Our Community' sash held aloft matter more. It is this call to arms that forms the heart of Daldry's production, as Billy becomes a potty-mouthed beacon of hope in a situation where picket line, thin blue line and chorus line rub uneasily up against each other. Given such a context, there is bound to be some pretty grown-up stuff going on here, be it the institutionalised homophobia in Billy's village, the class war going on within it, or Billy's grieving for his dead mother that drives his every move. And, as so magnificently choreographed by Peter Darling, what moves they are. Watch...
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