Dundee
Rep
Four
stars
There will
only ever be one Jim McLean, the legendary football manager, who, in the 1980s,
when the former joiner’s calling was still the people’s game, built a rundown
Dundee United team up from its foundations to become a major European force.
But beyond the emotional debris and layers of machismo protecting him, McLean
was a fragile construction likely to crumble before the final whistle blew.
All this
is brought home magnificently in Philip Differ’s dramatic love letter to
McLean, which moves between the blustering rage of his subject’s public persona
and the doubt-fuelled self-flagellation of the private man. This is made flesh
in Sally Reid’s production by a wonderful Barrie Hunter, who captures McLean’s
vulnerability with a lightness that can’t help but endear him even to those who
loved to hate this most pugnacious of characters.
With
Hunter pacing urgently across the expanse of Kenny Miller’s symbolic building
site set to the buzz of Fiona Johnston’s soundscape, he is accompanied by Chris
Alexander’s Jimmy. This track-suited foil marks the touchlines of McLean’s
life, prompting, pushing and cajoling like some good angel manager in waiting.
Over
the show’s hour-long duration, Differ teases the devoted with a few key anecdotes
that define McLean, but goes for the man rather than the ball in exposing all
the complexities of a working class Lanarkshire kid thrust into the spotlight.
Beyond
McLean, Differ has penned a much bigger elegy to the breed of back-street
mavericks such as McLean and other managers of his generation who had a near
holy devotion to a sport yet to be overtaken by those obsessed with money more than
football. Out of this comes a human portrait of a flawed genius, delivered with
a warts and all mixture of brutality and tenderness that makes the game beautiful
once more.
The Herald, February 24th 2020
Ends
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