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The Tommy Burns Story

King’s Theatre, Glasgow

Four stars

 

The football season may theoretically be over for the summer, but as diehard fans know in their bones, it never really ends. With this in mind, this latest and apparently final run of Davie Carswell’s loving homage to one of Celtic Football Club’s greatest heroes, whose life was so cruelly cut short by skin cancer in 2008 aged just 51, could probably be seen as either a pre season warm-up. 

 

And what a match Carswell and director Adam Felix O’brien have knitted together. Burns is brought to life by way of a series of dramatised anecdotes that make up the story of a man who came up from Glasgow’s Calton district to become a top-flight player and manager of the team that was already in his blood. As the play makes clear too, Burns never forgot his own description of himself as ‘a supporter who got lucky.’

 

Football may be at the play’s centre, but Carswell’s script focuses on the man beyond, be it as husband, father, devout Catholic and, in the eyes of many, a real life saviour. Standing forever beside the love of his life Rosemary, we see Burns as hopeless at housework as he is nimble on the dancefloor. He moves from living room to chapel with an easy humour and a common touch that translated readily to the millions of fans who put their faith in him, knowing he was one of them. 

 

As embodied by Liam Harkins, Burns here is possessed with heroism and humility, kept on an even keel by Rosemary, played with just as much heart by Sarah-Louise Greer. James McAnerney, Ruairidh Forde and Tom Carter double up as assorted interviewers, priests and a green clad chorus who mark the passing of time with comic banter. 

 

With Burns’ son Michael as executive producer on the show, both he, his siblings and their now sadly late mother are shown interviewed on film. The result is as much family album as theatre in a show that brings the audience together to pay tribute in an act of mutual devotion to their hero that ensures his memory will live forever.


The Herald, July 14th 2025

 

ends 

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