PITLOCHRY is the setting for a new production of The Crucible, Arthur Miller’s drama based on the Salem witch trials of the 1690s.
Miller’s cautionary tale, which compares the 17th-century trials to anti-communist persecution of the postwar McCarthyite era, is one of six productions presented across the coming weeks as part of Pitlochry Festival Theatre’s summer season.
The revival of the 1953 classic is the directorial debut at Pitlochry Festival Theatre (PFT) of new artistic director Elizabeth Newman.
Newman, pictured below, who joined PFT in September 2018 from Bolton’s Octagon Theatre, says her choice of setting Miller’s play in the Perthshire burgh was a carefully considered one.
“I walked around the town asking some important questions,” Newman says. “What can we make together? What will support people to empathise with each other? How can we explore our current global political turmoil? How can we begin to understand the toxic, social denigration generated through fake news?”
She continues: “It wasn’t until I stood on Pitlochry Community Bridge that I found the answer. I looked out at our landscape – a community divided by a river, connected by a wobbly bridge, and realised, we must produce The Crucible. The similarities between Miller’s metaphorical world of 1692 Salem and Pitlochry are profound.”
Newman’s play has renewed resonance in a time of social and political upheaval and uncertainty.
“It feels like a fantastic story for now,” she says. “It’s about those decisions we have to take on a micro-scale, about who we want to be personally, about holding on to our integrity and what we believe in, when faced with an awful situation. It’s a note for all of us, that when the chips are down, that we have the choice to actually make the right decision.”
The Crucible, which opened at PFT this week, is a gear-change in the theatre’s summer season. Running already are productions of Noel Coward’s Blithe Spirit, Alan Plater’s Blitz spirit musical Blonde Bombshells Of 1943 and 1960s good-time sing-along Summer Holiday.
Opening in the coming weeks will be Heritage by Scottish playwright Nicola McCartney and the world premiere of Elizabeth Gaskell’s North And South adapted for stage by veteran writer and actress Janys Chambers.
All productions run in parallel until the end of September, meaning theatre-lovers can see six plays in less than a week, with many members of PFT’s 17-strong professional ensemble often switching character, genre, era and accent from day to day, and even sometimes within the same day.
The PFT team says no other UK theatre presents a similar repertory experience, with only a theatre in Canada offering something “remotely similar” to their varied summer season.
“I was really keen to give a diverse diet, a really rich experience of productions for audiences to enjoy,” says Newman. “I think of PFT as a ‘national theatre of Pitlochry’ so within that we should be able to have comedy, musicals, plays with music, dramas like The Crucible, new adaptations like Janys’s adaptation of North and South and revivals of great Scottish plays like Heritage.”
Accessibility is a focus for the theatre this summer, with the season offering for the first time dementia-friendly and relaxed performances, as well as performances with BSL and captioning.
In the theatre’s garden, work for early years is now being presented, another first for PFT.
“It’s all abut opening out the theatre, ensuring everyone has the opportunity to engage,” says Newman. “We really want to be a theatre for a lifetime, irrespective of how old you are, where you are in your life, there’s something for everyone here, and we want everyone to be a part of it.”
Opening in late July is Heritage, Nicola McCartney's story of love and treachery and religious tribalism set in 1914 in the Canadian prairies.
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First staged at Edinburgh’s Traverse in 1998 in the wake of the Belfast Agreement, though McCarthy’s stark, lyrical play has been produced around the world, this summer’s PFT revival will be its first in Scotland.
“I’m a massive fan of Nicola McCarthy’s work,” says Newman. “She’s a wonderful playwright. It feels really important to be reviving these important, vital, con-temporary Scottish plays.”
In August, Newman will direct the world premiere of Elizabeth Gaskell’s classic 19th-century novel North and South.
She commissioned the adaptation from Bafta-nominated writer Chambers upon her arrival at PFT last year.
Though adapted for TV by the BBC in the early 2000s, Newman’s version, which sees a large community cast join PFT’s professional ensemble, will be the first time Gaskell’s play has been presented on the stage.
“We’ve got 42 local people signed up,” says Newman. “That’s really important to me, putting our community at the heart of the work.”
Newman came to know the Victorian writer and educationalist’s work through her biography of Charlotte Bronte.
Like The Crucible and Heritage, North and South’s exploration of class in 1850s Manchester feels sharply relevant today, says Newman.
“North and South explores factory workers trying to gain adequate rights while also looking very carefully at the plight of the manufacturers,” says Newman. “I think what’s really important about it is again having that conversation which is entirely relevant to questions today about what it means to be a worker in economic decline in industry, which is obviously where we are at the moment.”
The Crucible: Until September 27; Summer Holiday: Until October 5; Blithe Spirit: Until September 28; Blonde Bombshells of 1943: Until September 27; Heritage: July 25 to September 26; North and South: August 29 to Septmeber 25, various times, £14 to £25. Tel: 01796 484 626. pitlochryfestivaltheatre.com
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