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Latest: Friday 18 March 2011

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Hill start

MUCH excitement at Glasgow's Citizens Theatre which has announced that its next artistic director will be Dominic Hill. Soon to complete his fourth year at Edinburgh's Traverse, Hill will move into the vacant director's chair in October, more than a year after Jeremy Raison left the building. Pictured at the 2010 Critics' Awards for Theatre in Scotland (pic: Lloyd Smith), where his productions of The Dark Things and The Goat were both feted, Hill made his name at Dundee Rep with acclaimed stagings including Peer Gynt and Scenes from an Execution. He is currently directing The City Madam by Philip Massinger for the Royal Shakespeare Company in a production that will open in Stratford-upon-Avon in May. Speaking to the Herald, Hill said: "I want the main stage to see classical work, work presented in a way that is innovative and accessible for contemporary audiences. It’s all about creating exciting theatre." It's great news for Glasgow, but who should replace him at the Traverse? Fact fans may note there will also be a vacancy at the West Yorkshire Playhouse which ex-Traverse director Ian Brown is leaving after ten years. Join the debate here.

Byrne out

PLENTY of activity at the Traverse in the mean time, however. This Tuesday's Staging the Nation event organised by the National Theatre of Scotland is dedicated to The Slab Boys by John Byrne, who will also be in the public eye when his children's storybook Donald & Benoît (pictured) is published in April. Expected on stage or in the audience are original director David Hayman, Robbie Coltrane (Jack Hogg), Jim Byars (Spanky), Pat Doyle (Hector), Carey Wilson (Willie Curry) and Ida Schuster (Sadie), as well as Chris Parr and Bill Paterson who were around at the time of the first production in 1978.

Cut it out

THEATRE Uncut started earlier this week in London and flourishes in style tomorrow in cities across Britain including Glasgow and Edinburgh where specially written plays are being staged to protest about the government's public spending cuts. Writers including David Greig, Dennis Kelly and Mark Ravenhill have donated short pieces which, for the duration of the event, can be performed rights free. Pictured are student actors at Edinburgh's Bedlam Theatre, performing seven plays (although sadly not David Greig's) from noon until late, during a day that will also feature music, comedy and poetry. In Glasgow, you can see Petulance Arts performing upstairs in the Curlers Rest on Byres Road from 7pm. Then over at the Arches from 8pm, you can see Kevin Guthrie, Anne Lacey, Louise Ludgate and Kieran Hurley give readings of five plays, including Greig's Fragile. More politically incendiary news seeps out from the Traverse where the theatrical response to the forthcoming elections – along the lines of Gordon Brown: A Life in Theatre – will probably be called Hotel Caledonia.

Quids in

ON the subject of money matters, Creative Scotland has announced its first corporate plan and there are interesting responses to it on Anne Bonnar's blog and the Herald's podcast.