It’s Midsummer’s weekend in Edinburgh. It’s raining. Two thirtysomethings are sitting in a New Town bar waiting for something to turn up. Read more …
He’s a failing car salesman on the fringes of the city’s underworld and she’s a high powered divorce lawyer with a taste for other people’s husbands. She’s out of his league and he’s not her type at all. They absolutely should not sleep together. Ever. Ever.
Which is why they do…
Midsummer [a play with songs] is the story of Bob and Helena and a great lost weekend of bridge burning, car chases, wedding bust-ups, bondage miscalculations, midnight trysts and horrible hungover self loathing misery.
Featuring Cora Bissett and Matthew Pidgeon as the ill-advised love match, Midsummer is a quirky, charming love story by one of Scotland’s leading playwrights, David Greig and top Edinburgh singer/songwriter, Gordon McIntyre of the band ballboy.
With Bissett and Pidgeon giving a real spontaneity to their performances, this is a bright, imaginative and fresh piece of theatre.
As the mismatched lovers, Cora Bissett and Matthew Pidgeon are extraordinary. Flitting from guitar to ukulele and shape shifting from character to character, this incredible pair fills the stage in a way that a one-hundred strong ensemble could not, delivering the material with all of the conviction of stand-up and performing some of the most moving folksongs in Scottish theatre with affectingly heavy hearts...A must see.
That its specific reference to real places has been no obstacle to the show’s success is an important lesson: the universality of this tale is reinforced by the faithfulness of all its details.
Stage: The Lost weekend
Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh from Thursday January 19, 2012, until Friday January 20, 2012. More info: www.traverse.co.uk