National Theatre of Scotland

National Theatre of Scotland's tfd season targets teenage audience

23 Feb 2010

‘Teenagers aren’t aliens, they’re just us but younger.’ It’s a fact easily forgotten but one that playwright Rob Drummond and the rest of the team behind a new season for young people from the National Theatre of Scotland are keeping firmly in mind.

NTS history and Gutter magazine latest National Library of Scotland events

1 Feb 2010

Eagle-eyed readers of the Around Town listings may have already noticed that change is afoot at the National Library of Scotland. Over the last few months, there have been an increasing number of interesting, well thought-out, exciting and downright…

Arches Off-Site

20 Jan 2010

Forget being entertained from the comfort of a velvety chair in an auditorium. Recent theatre performances in underground vaults, toilet cubicles or lifts have opened Scottish audiences’ eyes to the added value that site specific and promenade…

Long Gone Lonesome

19 Jan 2010

Vicky Featherstone’s production for the National Theatre of Scotland reaches the end of its Scottish tour with a couple of performances at the Tron as part of Celtic Connections. Duncan McLean’s piece of musical theatre tells the story of Thomas Fraser…

Promises Promises - Douglas Maxwell interview

12 Jan 2010

With The Miracle Man, his play for the NTS slated to open in March, Douglas Maxwell will be in familiar territory. Spotty trauma, adolescent angst and the icky business of entering into the adult world are house themes for Maxwell, and this new work, in…

Big Picture: Wall of Death - A Way of Life

8 Jan 2010

A treat for all those who love a spectacle as the National Theatre of Scotland joins forces with visual artist Stephen Skrynka. The artist’s learning to ride the Wall of Death with the world-famous Ken Fox Troupe inspired this stunning multi-media…

2010 preview: Great expectations

7 Jan 2010

Favourite things are ending, exciting things are beginning and old things are coming back. 2010 is already shaping up to be a thrilling year and here are the 30 good reasons why we can’t wait

Blipfoto, Channel 4, NTS and Scottish Screen launch photography competition

7 Jan 2010

With the New Year’s resolutions now in full swing, daily photo blogging community Blipfoto has teamed up with Channel 4, the National Theatre of Scotland and Scottish Screen to create a unique international photography competition. With followers and…

Curtain up

7 Jan 2010

The National Theatre of Scotland has launched its programme for 2010, with highlights including a new piece of work by the team behind worldwide hit Black Watch. In line with the company’s ethos of working with a variety of art forms, in February and…

Best of a decade: Black Watch premieres in Edinburgh

2 Dec 2009

Every decade, there seems to be one cultural event that shifts the way we Scots look at ourselves, and the way the world looks at us. In the 1990s, there was the Trainspotting juggernaut: book, play, film, tie-in-soundtrack, poster. In the 2000s, what…

Best of a decade: Respectable in the Noughties

2 Dec 2009

Much of the most powerful art produced in Scotland in the 1980s–1990s developed in angry reaction to the political situation and tapped into our radical, left-wing and egalitarian traditions – it’s no accident that the most popular works of that period…

Natalie Merchant, The Chieftains and Ry Cooder set for Celtic Connection 2010

30 Oct 2009

Celtic Connections launched with a suitable level of expectation this fortnight – and it doesn’t look set to disappoint. Comprising 1500 artists, 300 concerts, ceilidhs, talks, workshops, free events and late-night sessions, the programme of events will…

Scottish Mental Health Arts and Film Festival 2009 launches

10 Sep 2009

Singer Karine Polwart is just one of the many names putting her name – and voice – behind this year’s Scottish Mental Health Arts and Film Festival. Now in its third year, the festival explores mental health in its broadest sense with almost 200 events…

Festival of Politics tackles devolution and the Arts

James Kelman, Vicky Featherstone and Germaine Greer on bill

6 Aug 2009

The Scottish Parliament’s annual festival of issues and debate is back again, with lectures on everything from the legality of Facebook to diabetes and time travel. Other events catching our beady little eyes include a discussion on Devolution and the…

Best of the Rest - Politics

Political highlights at the Edinburgh Festivals

13 Jul 2009

Highlights include Annie Lennox and the SING campaign, From Darwin to Dolly: And Beyond, A Life in Politics: Dennis Canavan, Devolution and the Arts, Young Peoples Question Time, Burns' Radical Voice and Love But Her

Peer Gynt

14 May 2009

Colin Teevan’s irreverent adaptation of Ibsen’s classic play returns to the scene of its original triumph with a brief run at Dundee Rep before embarking on a tour of Scottish cities over the next couple of months. This thrilling, energetic…

Be Near Me

19 Mar 2009

The story of a priest who stirs up a riot of anti-Catholic feeling in a Protestant Ayrshire town after a drunken fumble with a teenage boy might not instantly sound like it would travel well outside the west of Scotland or Ireland. But, since its…

Nobody Will Ever Forgive Us

27 Nov 2008

NEW PLAY It’s hard to shake off the feeling that this final production in the National Theatre of Scotland’s series of Traverse Debuts is set in a bygone era. The story of a young man returning home from the seminary, disillusioned with Catholicism…

Eye to the future at the end of the line for Edinburgh Festival 2008

Alan Bissett's festival blog

27 Aug 2008

Ah, the end of the Fringe. Goodbye rain. Goodbye bright-eyed young hopefuls thrusting flyers. Goodbye posh accents. How was it for you? Depending on who you talk to, plays this year have been too bleak/political/teenage. Given the gloomy political…

365

Magical reflection on children in care

26 Aug 2008

The idea of a play about children in care might not immediately strike you as the an entertaining festival night out, but overcome your prejudices. Vicky Featherstone’s production of David Harrower’s script for the NTS touches upon the issues that…

365 - One Night to Learn a Lifetime

Shock tactics

21 Aug 2008

With 365, a series of fragmented narratives about children leaving care, Vicky Featherstone’s National Theatre of Scotland cements its commitment to telling stories of the people. Kirstin Innes meets the cast, writer and director. Lunchtime, and…

Best of the rest - Edinburgh International Festival

Edinburgh International Festival

22 Jul 2008

Giselle. Under the artistic direction of Nina Ananiashvili, the State Ballet of Georgia will be performing what many view as the definitive interpretation of this romantic ballet. Gabriela Montero Two performances here from the superb Venezuelan…

Little Otik - Sandy Grierson

22 May 2008

‘It’s a bit of wood!’ ‘That’s my baby!’ ‘It’s a bit of wood!’ ‘My BABY!’ The air in the Citizens’ Theatre is thick with the smell of peat, spread all over the stage where actors Sandy Grierson and Louisa Ludgate are rehearsing what, taken out of…

The Emperor’s New Kilt

24 Apr 2008

CHILDREN’S THEATRE Theatre Royal, Glasgow, Thu 24–Sat 26 Apr It’s hard to know who to praise most for this clever, funny and engaging show. There is not a single weak link to be found. The intelligent script blends humour, pathos and insightful…

New work and literary adaptations form the back bone of the National Theatre’s season

18 Apr 2008

The National Theatre of Scotland have just announced their 08/09 season, a programme dominated by emergent theatre makers and literary adaptations. John Tiffany will direct 'Be Near Me', an adaptation of Scottish writer Andrew O’Hagan’s hugely acclaimed…