Lewis Grassic Gibbon play at Perth Theatre

Nov 6 2009 by Alison Anderson, Perthshire Advertiser Friday

TWO of Scotland’s most respected actors come to Perth Theatre next Friday and Saturday (November 13 and 14) with their highly-acclaimed recital of a new play by author and broadcaster Jack Webster which maps out the life of Scottish writer J Leslie Mitchell – better known as Lewis Grassic Gibbon.

Vivien Heilbron and Michael Mackenzie, premiered The Life of Grassic Gibbon at His Majesty’s Theatre, Aberdeen, last year, and this week they return to their roles for a short re-run at His Majesty’s before going on a nine-date Scottish tour.

The play tells the story of the illustrious Scots novelist from his early years in Auchterless and Arbuthnott, his struggle for recognition in his youth to his successful years and premature death at just 34.

A prolific author both in his own right and using his pseudonym, J Leslie Mitchell wrote 17 books on subjects as diverse as archaeology and exploration. However, it is as Grassic Gibbon that he is best known and in particular for his trilogy A Scots Quair – Sunset Song, Cloud Howe and Grey Granite.

A TV adaptation of the trilogy was a huge success in the 1970s starring Vivien Heilbron in the central role of Chris Guthrie.

“I can’t help looking back on so many incredible memories and to the original cast of Sunset Song, an incomparable cast of Scottish actors, many of whom are no longer with us,” she said.

“The television programme was quite instrumental in raising Gibbon's publicity. It put him on the school curriculum where he had not been before.

“I never thought when we filmed Sunset Song all those years ago, that the part of Chris Guthrie and the connection with Grassic Gibbon would still be with me so many years later.

“And I am thrilled to be doing this with my very dear friend Michael Mackenzie, whom I have known for even more years!” she added.

And Michael is very well-known to regular theatregoers in Scotland and for his extensive television and radio work spanning many decades.

He’s a pensioner now, but still in demand as an actor, although he can now be more selective in the work he takes on – most recent of which was the fast-moving, action-packed The Silver Darlings, which completed its extremely successful tour at Perth Theatre last Saturday.

He said of the Grassic Gibbon production: “I think Perth Theatre will be perfect for it. It’s not a play as such, but it is a pleasant, amusing, moving and we hope informative evening with some nice music and lovely slides on the backdrop.

“Vivien narrates and where necessary speaks some of Chris Guthrie’s words, and I play a kind of ghost of Lewis Grassic Gibbon as he would have been had he had lived to my age. I think the production works well and the audience get a lot out of it.

“The public do, after all, love Sunset Song and the other books of his Scots Quair, but they know very little about the man who wrote it.

“He was such a talented writer but had a huge struggle to get accepted in his own country.”

Tickets for Grassic Gibbon are available from the box offices at Perth Theatre and Perth Concert Hall, telephone 01738 621031 and online www.horsecross.co.uk