There are thousands of shows in Edinburgh this month. Please explain why we should come and see yours. So Young is on at the legendary Traverse Theatre, the spiritual and literal home of playwriting in Scotland.
It’s our Cavern Club, our CBGBs. If you like theatre at all you should catch everything you can in that building. Plus, So Young is good.
You’ll feel something. I promise. Who or what was the biggest inspiration for your show? I wanted to write about that feeling of changing “age”, inside, depending on who we’re with or what we’re doing.
We can suddenly feel young: reckless, unbreakable, flirty...
unworldly, ignorant, childish. Then a moment later we can feel ancient: forgotten, decrepit and redundant..
. wise and battle scarred. What’s the best review you’ve ever had, and the worst? A guy in a pub once said that a play of mine was, for him, “up there with Jaws”.
I’ve had a zero star review in a national newspaper. I didn’t read it, but when you’ve been in the business for as long as I have you can almost sense that it would be quite negative. Who or what are you most excited about seeing this year? The Fifth Step.
VL. The Outrun. The Bookies.
June. Love Beyond. The History of Paper.
We Used To Be Girl Scouts. 27. Chatterbox.
Same Team. Oran. Tell us something about you that would surprise people.
I’ve never had a genuinely brilliant night in a restaurant. What are the best and worst things that have happened to you at the festival? It was the same thing. My show had finished and I was hanging around in the Traverse bar, waiting on pals.
But for some reason I decided to dodge out and head back home to Glasgow. I got a text when my train was passing Croy: Nick Cave had turned up. In the Traverse.
With my pals. Worst, because..
.well, obvious reasons. Best, because I dodged the chance of almost certainly making a fool of myself and poisoning all that beautiful music.
What’s the first thing you do in the morning and the last thing you do at night? Half-hearted back stretches (with swearing). Playwrights often have bad backs, insomnia and inexplicably good-looking partners. Thanks for the interview! We’d like to buy you a drink.
Where are we going and what are we drinking? Guinness. Please and thank you. I’ll be in The Traverse bar, where a strange robot pump pours the Guinness from a can and then turns it into draught with some kind of AI voodoo.
Machines can pour Guinness but they can’t drink it. Sad, in a way. Another thing machines can’t do is theatre.
They can’t create it and they can’t experience it. Theatre only happens with humans in a room which is the very thing we’re all celebrating at the Festival, don’t you think? So Young, Traverse Theatre (Venue 15) until 25 August We're offering 40% off an annual digital subscription to The Scotsman, so you can enjoy a summer of amazing content for less. Checkout using promo code SUMMER40.
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