Quest for a Scottish Musical

CAROL METCALFE sets the scene for the final Highland Quest showcase in Ullapool
 

THE FIVE FINALISTS in the Highland Quest will gather in Ullapool to prepare 25-minute excerpts from their shows. On Friday the public will be able to chose their own preference, and on Saturday it will be the turn of the judges – including myself – to come to a decision and announce the winner.

The five were chosen after a rigorous selection process in March (see below for details). It was organized by Chris Grady of Cameron MacKintosh Ltd, who has huge experience. We were working from paper and recordings of music at that point, and Chris came up with a structure in which we privately listed all the shows we had read in order of preference, and just by doing that it was obvious that there were a group of shows that could be eliminated quickly.

It was a very good process, and I think all of us went in with some preconceived ideas, but they were modified in turn by what other people had to say, and that is always healthy in a judging process. It was a genuine discussion, and we spent a long time on it. I felt everyone’s work had been taken seriously.

In addition to myself, the judges are lyricist and director Anthony Drewe, composer and director George Stiles, and two distinguished practitioner-teachers from the RSAMD, John Wallace and Maggie Kinloch. Sir Cameron MacKintosh wasn’t able to join us, but he sent in his selections, and Eden Court’s Colin Marr assumed something of a chair role, although he gave us his opinions very vigorously as well, as he should – it is for his theatre, after all!

One of the great excitements of the competition has been that people have presented a really wide range of work, and the five finalists are all very different

As the competition progressed. Colin felt that additional bits of support were going to be necessary to help things develop, and asked me to take on a further role as a kind of creative advisor to the finalists. I don’t think he had planned that in advance, but had very sensibly waited to see what people might need and what came out of the competition.

He asked me to lead a week of workshops in April in Glasgow, and as a result of that I was asked to keep in touch with the writers and directors, and also to be in Ullapool for the rehearsals as well as judging at the weekend. My role is really to be a go-fer, helping out with whatever they need.

The week in April was also about helping the writers to understand the points the judges had made. We had 12 students from the RSAMD, and were able to play around with things and experiment a bit – anything that would help the writers with their ideas. George and Anthony flew up for a day and were able to discuss the music with the writers.

Time is very tight in terms of actual rehearsal, and the fact that the writers are having to present short versions of their shows has been very difficult for them, but also an essential part of the process. What they have been asked to do at this stage is put together an excerpt of 20 or 25 minutes that will give the flavour of their show. When we met in March for the last round of judging to pick the five finalists, with each one of them we felt that there were certain areas that needed attention, which is not surprising given that none of them had written a musical before.

We said that by July we needed to see that they were going to be able to attend to the areas we had identified, whether that was plot development or characterization or an aspect of the music – there were different things in each case. That doesn’t mean to say that they have to have got it completely right, but we have to see that they do have a plan to address the problematic issues.

It is very difficult for them to do all of that in 25 minutes, and also come up with something that gives not only the judges but the audience a full flavour of their show. As judges we have seen all their plans, whatever form they take, but the audience don’t have the benefit of that. So they have to show us that they are moving forward as we wanted, and they have to entertain the audience, all in 25 minutes, and that is quite a tall order. They have being very ingenious so far about how they will do that, I have to say.

You might think that seeing only part of a show would also make the judging process harder, but in a funny way it didn’t, and in some ways it may even have made it easier. There is a well-known saying in the business that musicals aren’t written, they are re-written, which is true. Musical theatre is a particularly complicated form – you have the disparate elements of drama and music to pull together, and there are so many ways that can be done. It is a very exciting place at the moment, and people are coming up with all kinds of ways of creating musical theatre.

If you look at something very successful like ‘Billy Elliot’, or even ‘Mary Poppins’, where a structure already existed, a huge amount of work has gone into remaking that for the stage. All of us on the judging panel have had experience of that process, and at this stage in Highland Quest, we are looking for the potential in the idea and the way they are looking to develop that idea through the resources of musical theatre.

We are not going in there to place a predetermined template on their work and see if it fits. One of the great excitements of the competition has been that people have presented a really wide range of work, and the five finalists are all very different. I have really enjoyed being involved in the development aspects of the competition, although I did worry briefly that it might compromise my impartiality as a judge.

However, the opposite has happened – having worked with all of them, I now have even less idea than before about which one I think should win! I think each of them has enormous potential, and it is going to come down to how we feel when we see these final excerpts and the associated plans they will lay before us.

The other thing that should be said is that whoever wins in Ullapool is really only at the start of a difficult process, not the end. A year from July sounds like a long time for the winner to develop the show, but musicals have a history of taking a very long time to develop. It is quite a task, and there cannot be any guarantees.

Each of these shows has a different quality to it that makes it exciting, and that is definitely one of the things that we were looking for as judges, that ‘wow’ factor, but that is notoriously difficult to realise in any show. The potential is there whoever wins it, but they don’t have a lot of time to get it right.

I do feel very optimistic about that potential, though, and I would like to think that it won’t just be one show that will have further life after this weekend in Ullapool. I’m hoping other producers might be interested in advancing at least some of the shows.

Highland Quest was launched just over 18 months ago by the Scottish Minister for Culture, Tourism and Sport Patricia Ferguson, theatrical impresario Sir Cameron Mackintosh and Eden Court Director Colin Marr, with the aim of finding a new and original piece of musical theatre that would appeal to a modern Scottish audience.

The five finalists are:

‘The Sundowe’, by Edinburgh based brothers John, James and Gerry Kielty. This musical has been described as a cross between ‘Thriller’ and ‘Shaun of the Dead’.

‘Balloons’, by Arran-based writing team Alison Prince and Andrew Keeling. Their musical is set on Arran, sometime in the future as global warming threatens the island communities.

‘Marrying Meg’, by Blairgowrie based writer Mark Robertson. His story is based on faerie tales from the Scottish Borders.

‘Whisky Kisses’, by Highlands-based Euan Martin, Dave Smith and James Bryce. Their musical follows two fanatical whisky collectors as they vie for a bottle of very rare malt.

‘Shenachie’ was created by classical composer Sally Beamish and poet Donald Goodbrand Saunders. It is set in a remote glen at the time of the Clearances with a story that weaves throughout history.

Highlights from each of these musicals will be performed at the Showcase Final. The eventual winner will be developed as the first show to open the newly constructed second theatre at Eden Court before embarking on a Highlands-wide tour as part of Highland 2007.

The Showcase Final will be filmed by Endemol, who have been following the entire Highland Quest journey for a series of documentaries for BBC Scotland. The Highland QUEST Showcase Final is at The MacPhail Centre, Ullapool, on 7 and 8 July.

(Carol Metcalfe was the founder and director of the Bridewell Theatre in London, and has wide experience in musical theatre. She spoke to Kenny Mathieson)

© Kenny Mathieson, 2006

Links

• Eden Court Theatre