Theatre: The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart

by David Greig

The National Theatre of Scotland

Directed by Wils Wilson

Composer and musical director Alasdair Macrae

With Annie Grace, Melody Grove, Alasdair Macrae, Paul McCole and David McKay

Little Creatures Loft and The Melbourne Hotel until February 24 (waiting list only)

Last year you could still get a ticket to The National Theatre of Scotland’s pulverising Beautiful Burnout deep into the season. No such luck this time. The company’s third visit to the Perth Festival, The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart, already has a waiting list, and it’s going to get very, very long.

The rush is, in part, because of the company’s well-earned reputation here, and because the festival’s publicity promised “rip-roaring action” set, and performed, in a bar, and that’s bound to pull Perth punters.

The good news, for those of you holding tickets, is that Prudencia Hart delivers all that’s promised for it, and a whole lot besides.

Theatre: Beautiful Burnout

by Bryony Lavery

Frantic Assembly and the National Theatre of Scotland

Directed and choreographed by Scott Graham and Steven Hoggett

Featuring the music of Underworld

With Blythe Duff, Kevin Guthrie, Eddie Kay, Vicki Manderson, Stuart Martin, Taqi Nazeer and Ewan Stewart  

ABC East Perth Studios

10 - 25 February, 2012

Eddie Kay, Taqi Nazeer, Vicki Manderson and Kevin Guthrie

We stood on the pavement outside the ABC’s East Perth Studios wiping our eyes and gasping for breath. The cause of this disruption to our emotional equilibrium was the mighty Beautiful Burnout, the collaboration between the National Theatre of Scotland and Frantic Assembly, the company of directors Scott Graham and Steven Hogget that anchors this year’s PIAF theatre programme.

I only hope that the rest of Jonathan Holloway’s first festival has other shows as good as this. It will have none better.

If sport is devilishly hard to fictionalise on film – perhaps boxing and baseball are the only games to produce a body of satisfying cinema – you’d be forgiven for believing it was impossible to bring to the live stage. It’s the miracle of Beautiful Burnout that the muscularity, discipline and beauty of training and sparring, and, eventually, the peril and violence of the prize fight, come to life with an intensity and authenticity of unparalleled effectiveness. 


Link here to the complete review in The West Australian