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Mr Bolfry

1942: World War II is raging, drawing millions into an epic global struggle between good and evil. Yet in a Manse of the Free Kirk somewhere in the Western Highlands, on a dreich Sunday afternoon, the struggle is more about staving off boredom . . . Read more …

The moralising Minister, Mr. McCrimmon, and his wife have reluctantly done their bit for the war effort and allowed two English soldiers, Cully and Cohen, to be billeted at the Manse. But Cully and Cohen are young city-dwellers, with little interest in McCrimmon's puritanical sermons. And they're bored. And having been “blitzed about” a bit in London, Jean, the McCrimmons' very modern niece, is also staying at the Manse, taking a week's holiday...and she's bored, too. And it's about to rain. Again.

But then Cohen stumbles across an unusual book in the Manse library, which seems to contain instructions for raising the Devil. Well, that might help pass the time, mightn't it? So after the McCrimmons have retired for the evening, the threesome gather at midnight and begin to read aloud.


The critical consensus

However, fun though it is at times, this somewhat leaden piece does nothing to convince me that Bridie should be restored to a revered position in Scottish theatre.

Mark Brown, Scottish Stage (Sunday Herald), 04/09/2014

If the play is a period piece, though, it’s a rich, interesting and intelligent one; graced with a fine, sensitive production by Patrick Sandford, and played out with wit and energy against the mountain backdrop of Charles Cusick Smith’s atmospheric open set.

***(*)(*)Joyce McMillan, The Scotsman, 06/09/2014

For all the play's lofty moral aspirations, all aboard Sandford's production are having great fun with it, adding levity to what could be rendered as an overly verbose affair.

***(*)(*)Neil Cooper, Coffee-Table Notes, 15/09/2014

Where and when?

Pitlochry Festival Theatre, Pitlochry from Thursday August 21, 2014, until Saturday October 18, 2014. More info: www.pitlochry.org.uk

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