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The Four Horsemen -
tour
Playwright & Director - Judy Steel
Set Designer - David Toneri
Lighting Designer - Matthew Burgess
Costume Designer - Carol Bell
Sound - Alistair Patullo
Music - Hilary Bell and Ian Lowthain
Company - Rowan Tree Company
Venue seen - Bowhill Theatre
I recommend booking for the after show suppers which are tasty and convivial
as you are served at buffet and all eat by candlelight in a warm room
with a bar. Call 01750 22204 to get the theatre's programme.
Venues & Dates - listed at end of review
Reviewer - Thelma Good
Reflecting changes in Border life
The Four Horsemen of the apocalypse seemed to be stalking the Borders
of Scotland last year when foot and mouth began to ravage the land. Judy
Steel's contemporary play, enriched with Border Scots, links those events
with the changes in the ridings of the Marches, the four horsemen who
ensured the Selkirk Common Riding happened in that grim farming year and
the wider changes in attitudes to rural life. It also weaves through it
the early 1900's Australian/Border poet, Will Ogilvie using poems and
writings with his reflections on his return to the Borders and poems byJohn
Buchan, R. S. Craig and modern poet David Purves. Isolating John Nicol's
Ogilvie to give his monologues from one side of the stage, only works
effectively when he delivers Ogilvie's vivid poem on a terrible Australian
drought This makes a dramatic parallel across centuries and very different
farming lands - "for the leaders there is always hope but not for
the laggards".
The drama lies in the recent past. Charlie Laidlaw, Douglas Russell,
borders born and bred, deserted by his wife, is now raising sheep and
horses on his own Borders farm. He's visited by Aileen Armstrong, Fiona
Steele, who's been living in the US, researching for people their
links to the Scottish homeland. Also Borders bred, her attachment to the
area and to Charlie are still strong though she's clearly not hefted*
to it. Aileen wants to take part in the first mixed Riding, most are still
men only affairs, will Charlie let her hire a horse next summer? When
she returns to set up the ancestor business in Glasgow and visit Charlie
on weekends, the dreaded signs of the growing epidemic appear in the Borders.
The increasingly strong actor, Douglas Russell, holds us with the
sure rural charm of man who knows his yowes* from his tups* even though
Charlie can't quite see Aileen clearly. And Steele gives his returning
possible mate Aileen, spirit and heart as she gets told it's time she's
breeding, or tells Charlie how the townsfolk are seeing things very differently
through their urban eyes. As a response to an awful year Judy Steele's
play has a fitting sense of hard farming seasons elsewhere in different
times. It will reflect back, but not as strongly as it might, to urban
and rural audiences that beautiful scenery alone doesn't fill anyone's
bellies and how precarious life, love and future plans are.
© Thelma Good 11 May 2002
*Hefted - Some flocks of hill sheep have been born and bred on
the the same land for centuries, they know where to find shelter and forage
in a way bought-in flocks do not and they can be left on the hill all
year with miminal shepherding. Cheviots and Herdwicks are breeds which
heft to the land and hefted flocks are sold with the land. Many hefted
flocks of great antiquity were slaughtered in the UK's foot and mouth
epidemic of 2001. Yowes and Tups - Border words for Ewes and Rams
Tour
Details
Tickets also available for all dates from 01750 724901
11 May at 7:30pm Nr Selkirk Bowhill Theatre 01750 22204(pre-booking
advised)tour also ends here
12 May at 7:30pm at 7:30pm Broughton Village Hall Tks on
door or 01899 830465
14 May at 7:30pm Westruther Village Hall Tks on door or
01578 420275
17 May at 7:30pm Edinburgh Netherbow Tks on door or 0131
556 9579
19 May at 7:30pm Yetholm Wauchope Hall Tks on door or
01573 420 309 or 366
21 May at 7:30pm Glendouglas Village Hall Tks on door or
01835 863 604 or 274 or 01835 862536
24 & 25 May at 7:30pm Nr Selkirk Bowhill Theatre 01750
22204(pre-booking advised)
Tour ends.
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