Sunshine on Leith

A little ray of happiness on a rainy Glasgow evening, Dundee Rep’s Sunshine on Leith is a celebration of the music of The Proclaimers that captures the nature of the modern Scottish experience without the taste of shortbread.

Thankfully, the songs are quite subtly woven into this kitchen-sink drama. Whilst some numbers can be seen five hundred miles on the horizon, others are less obvious. Delightfully, Lets Get Married becomes a hymn to relationships and to football, as a proposal turns a Hibs bar into a church of life and of love.

Not unsurprisingly, the play is distinctly Caledonian in flavour, drawing on a rich shared cultural heritage of shipbuilding, union protests and the mysterious stench of the steps at Edinburgh’s Waverley station.

There can be no other musical in the canon where the stage direction is to throw a pound into a baby’s pram and such local references are wholly endearing to the Glasgow audience.

River City creator Stephen Greenhorn’s script is a genuinely funny flash of the kilt to Scottish humour, a banter to be shared amongst friends, peppered with ingratiating colloquialisms, irreverent slang and scenes deconstructing the emotional journey of an evening in the pub.

Musical Director Hilary Brooks has cleverly teased the country and western sounds that inspired The Proclaimers’s songs, finding a rich vaudeville character in the the violin and the trumpet that sit so comfortably within the musical tradition.

New life is breathed into the familiar songs, drawing attention to their wit and sensitivity. This is not the last song at a wedding, drunk and slurred, but a carefully crafted celebration of the Leith twins’ work.

Lord of the Rings star Billy Boyd has come from Mordor to Morningside. As recent army release Davy, Boyd is charming as the recognisable loveable chancer who could be found in any pub in Edinburgh. Bouncing on his confidence, Boyd belts out the audience favourites with gusto, coaxing the crowd into an uproar in the final ultimo of I’m Gonna Be.

As matriarch, Ann Louise Ross is filled with a powerful resilience recognisable in so many Scottish women. Her performance of the play’s title song is haunting, a sobering eleven o’clock number complimented by director James Brining’s delicate staging.

What Blood Brothers has done for Liverpool, Sunshine on Leith will surely do for Edinburgh.

Read the review and user comments for the May 2007 premiere production of Sunshine On Leith here.