Vicki Manderson
The Outrun (EIF)
★★★★☆ Grandeur
The Outrun, from the International Festival and the Lyceum at the Church Hill Theatre for the whole three weeks, is a hugely ambitious, beautifully staged and extremely impressive production.
Sunset Song
★★★☆☆ Well performed
Stage versions of Sunset Song seem to come around every couple of years, perhaps because no-one has managed to come up with the definitive adaptation yet. Dundee Rep’s new version (a co-production with the Lyceum) has great strengths as well as weaknesses.
Moonset
★★★☆☆ Brave
Moonset, Maryam Hamidi’s coming-of-age story from the Citizens Theatre at the Traverse, is full of fire and anger. Its wilful refusal to settle down proves both a strength and a weakness.
Orphans
★★★☆☆ Raucous
Full of comic bravado, the National Theatre of Scotland’s long-delayed musical adaptation of Orphans at the King’s is an attractive but unwieldy beast.
Light Boxes
✭✭✭✭✩ Love and regret:
Light Boxes is fascinating. Grid Iron Theatre Company has woven a complex web, leaving the audience struggling to interpret what they are seeing.
In Time o’ Strife
✭✭✭✭✩ Raw power
Visceral and uncomfortable truths are laid bare in the National Theatre of Scotland’s production of In Time O’ Strife. Despite the odd false step in the staging, this is an emotionally charged and thoroughly involving production.