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Wild Rose

Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh

Five stars 

 

When Dawn Sievewright stands at the front of an empty stage wielding a guitar at the end of Nicole Taylor’s stage version of her Tom Harper directed hit 2018 film, it doesn’t matter whether she is acting anymore. For the previous two and a half hours Sievewright has owned the Lyceum stage as Rose-Lynn Harlan, the big city girl with a tragic back-story and a dream of becoming a Country music star in Nashville. As she sings a heart rending version of Glasgow (No Place Like Home), the only song especially composed for the film, Sievewright transcends any fictional rendition to become the star Rose-Lynn so aspired to be.

 

Sievewright provides the heart and soul of John Tiffany’s all singing, all-dancing production, and is one of the many magnificent things about it. From the moment Rose-Lynn prepares to leave prison accompanied by a foot-tapping ensemble rendition of Primal Scream’s Country Girl onwards, Taylor, Tiffany and their posse of collaborators reinvent an already big-hearted experience as something fantastical.

 

Much of this is down to Steven Hoggett & Vicki Manderson’s formation choreography that sees a superlative cast shimmy their way across Chloe Lamford’s wide-open set. This is pulsed by an eight-piece house band arranged and overseen by Sarah Travis and Davey Anderson who accompany a set of less obvious Country classics. What emerges sees Rose-Lynn’s aspirations to get beyond her surroundings itself resemble the plot of a Country song come to life.

 

Sievewright is ably supported through all this by a big cast that includes Blythe Duff as her mum Marion, Janet Kumah as her posh boss turned would-be benefactor Susannah, and Andy Clark and Peter Hannah as assorted men folk. It is Sievewright herself who shines throughout. Clearly born to play Rose-Lynn, as she moves through an urban Glasgow take on the wild west, she inhabits her character as comfortably as a pair of boot cut jeans. By the end, Rose-Lynn may not be in Nashville anymore, but she sure has found her voice in a show that is a life-affirming line dance through her messy life that will remain the stuff of Country music forever.


The Herald, March 17th 2025

 

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