Supported by Benromach Single Malt Whisky

Created by David Greig (Writer) and Wils Wilson (Director) with Designer Georgia McGuinness, and Composer Alasdair Macrae.

Cast:  Andy Clark, Annie Grace, Alasdair Macrae, David McKay and Madeleine Worrall

Following on from its phenomenal success and critical acclaim, both on tour and at the 2011 Edinburgh Festival Fringe, The National Theatre of Scotland’s The Strange Undoing Of Prudencia Hart is touring to village halls throughout Scotland from 10 April 2012; visiting Blair Atholl, Nethy Bridge, Edinburgh, Torry, Kippen, Crianlarich, Kilcreggan, West Kilbride, Carlops and Kelso; with an opening performance at the Adam Smith Theatre, Kirkcaldy on Wednesday 11 April.

The production will also appear at UK festivals; including the Norwich and Norfolk Festival, Mayfest, Bristol and the Brighton Festival.  The Strange Undoing Of Prudencia Hart will then tour the UK and internationally until 2013.  Full tour details to be announced.  The original cast and creative team have reunited for this year long tour.

PUTTING THE DRAM INTO DRAMA

Benromach Single Malt Whisky is delighted to announce that following their successful partnership with National Theatre of Scotland and their support of the production at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, they will be back on board to sponsor the Scottish leg of the 2012 tour.  

Their sponsorship is part of Benromach’s venture into the arts and will enable each audience member in Scotland (18 years and above) to share a dram of Benromach Whisky during the show.

David Urquhart Joint Managing Director of Gordon & MacPhail, owners of the Benromach Distillery in Forres, said: “We’re excited to be continuing our sponsorship of the arts as The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart grows in popularity across Scotland and the rest of the UK. It’s a pleasure to be associated with such an individual and artistic performance, which we feel reflects many of the distinctive qualities of the various expressions of our malt whisky.”

One wintry morning Prudencia Hart, an uptight academic, sets off to attend a conference in Kelso, in the Scottish Borders. As the snow begins to fall, little does she know who or what awaits her there. Inspired by the Border Ballads – and delivered in a riotous romp of rhyming couplets, devilish encounters and wild karaoke – Prudencia’s dream-like journey of self-discovery unfolds among and around the audience.

The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart takes theatre into pubs and other unlikely venues, where stories are told, re-told, sung and passed on. Audiences are invited to share a lock-in with the National Theatre of Scotland’s company of actors and musicians and to indulge in an evening of supernatural storytelling, music and theatre inspired by the Border Ballads, Robert Burns and the poems of Robert Service.

‘The bare rolling stretch of country from the North Tyne and Cheviots to the Scottish southern uplands was for a long time the territory of men who spoke English but had the outlook of Afghan tribesmen; they prized a poem almost as much as plunder, and produced such an impressive assembly of local narrative songs that some people used to label all our greater folk poems as ‘Border Ballads’. AL Lloyd, ‘Folk Song in England’

The National Theatre of Scotland sent writer David Greig, director Wils Wilson and composer Alasdair Macrae to an old pub in Kelso in the Scottish Borders for the weekend,  to research the  Border Ballads for a new piece of theatre. It was the coldest winter for many years.  Maybe it was the unique atmosphere in the pub that night, or maybe it was the knee deep snow outside, but no one wanted the evening to end, so at midnight the Landlord closed the doors and they found themselves “locked in”. Deep in the wee hours, one old man told a story about another group of people who’d come to look for songs a few years back and of how one of them, a woman, had never after been seen again. It was a story, which he said was ‘one hundred and ten percent true’ a story of love, of music and of the Devil.  This was the inspiration for The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart.

The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart originally toured Scotland in February 2011 subsequently playing at Latitude Festival, Òran Mór, Glasgow, and the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in August 2011.  The production has won two awards, a Critics Award for Theatre for Best Music and Sound and a Herald Angel.

Source: National Theatre of Scotland