As we all plod our way through a bleak 2020, this strange year’s final month will be lit up by some festive fare from the Traverse Theatre’s all year digital platform known as Traverse 3. The range of shows, from new productions to returning shows, should bring some theatrical anticipation this advent.
Award winning Glasgow writer and performer, the wonderfully funny and thoughtful Gary McNair, brings a new presentation of his brilliant one man 2015 Fringe show, A Gambler’s Guide to Dying. This is an intergenerational tale of a boy’s granddad who won a fortune betting on the 1966 football World Cup then gambled it all on his living to see the year 2000 when he learned he had cancer. Available from 17th December 2020 till 27th January 2021 on a pay what you can basis, it comes in the form of a new theatrical capture, filmed on location around Glasgow and Traverse 1. The show’s premiere on the 17th December, will be followed by an exclusive Q & A session with McNair taking place on the Traverse Facebook page.
From 3rd December, writer and performer Dael Orlandersmith brings the 2019 Scotsman Fringe First winner Happenings: Until the Flood. The show, that’s based on the fallout after the shooting of a black teenager in Missouri in 2014, reflects on how communities can respond to injustice through creativity, is free to book. It has a live Q & A session with Dael Orlandersmith, Natasha Thembiso Ruwona and May Sumbwanyambe.
Following its original August run, a digital playShielders by Matilda Ibini, that’s influenced by Afrofuturism and classic sci-fi movies, is available from 3rd December 2020 till 31st January 2021 on a pay what you can basis.
Also from these dates and free to book will be the return of the 2020 Breakfast Plays; Second Helping that will comprise Contemporary Political Ethics (or How to Cheat) by Jamie Cowan; Rabbit Catcher by Rebecca Martin; Matterhorn by Amy Rhianne Milton; The Watercooler by Uma Nada-Rajah and Doomsdays by Conor O’Loughlin.
As well as this, the Traverse offers new podcast episodes featuring Jess Brough, Harry Josephine Giles and Bea Webster that will be available throughout December.
Traverse Executive Producer, Linda Crooks says “As we near the closure of the most challenging of years for us all, we felt it important to reflect on the times and what we know within the programme. Since the onset of the crisis, we at the Traverse were determined to lean into the challenges, which undeniably have been tough. Undaunted, we have sought to create and deliver an inventive and international programme of new and reimagined stories in whatever way we could – with Traverse 3 being the torchlight, our virtual alternative…
To this end, we invited our Associate Artist, Glasgow’s Gary McNair, to work with us to reimagine for Traverse 3 his hit show A Gambler’s Guide to Dying – a timely, heart-warming story about the relationship between fortune and fate and betting on what none of us can control. And from New York the titanic writer and performer Dael Orlandersmith gifts us her astonishing, gripping drama Until the Flood, the ugly truth about racism in the United States and beyond.
At the moment we can’t control our theatre spaces but …, we can bring you brilliant stories and give you something to mull over.”
The booking details of a very special Yuletide treat from the National Theatre of Scotland in partnership with Historic Environment Scotland will be announced soon. It takes the form of a live steaming of Rapunzel, written and directed by Scotland’s prince of Pantoland Johnny McKnight, from the grounds of Stirling Castle and will be available to view from 23rd December to 4th January.
Enough treats for now? Better get booking at the Traverse website!
Irene Brown
Radio Summerhall Arts 