THE CHEVIOT, THE STAG AND THE BLACK, BLACK OIL
Assembly/Wildcat at the Meadows, Edinburgh
August, 1991

John McGrath's ceilidh play is staged in a big top, and Jimmy Chisholm compères the show as a ringmaster of sorts while all around him the spirit of Archaos is discernible in the use of a gratuitous car and motorbike. The updates from its 1973 incarnation are erratic, and are changes of style rather than of substance. The story of centuries-old exploitation of the Scottish highlands, however, is as appalling and shocking as ever.

Written for The Independent.

Copyright © Ian Shuttleworth; all rights reserved.

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