It’s staggering to imagine that Moorcroft is Eilidh Mortgage’s first play. Seven years within the making, debuting in 2022 to common acclaim, it’s primarily based closely on Mortgage’s personal father’s experiences as a younger man in Nineteen Eighties Scotland. Such was the reception to the work that it’s again for an prolonged run at The Tron Theatre and an in depth tour of Scotland into November.
Instructed in flashback, breaking the fourth wall and spoken within the West of Scotland vernacular, within the current day it’s Garry’s (Martin Docherty) fiftieth birthday and looking out day-after-day and extra of these years, he recounts his and his buddies’ tales and the story of the soccer group that binds the septet collectively.
It tackles themes of race, homosexuality, sickness and male psychological well being. Brutally actual, these are a depressingly acquainted set of tales: feeling washed out and washed up at 19 years previous, missing and missed alternatives, intolerance of every part that’s completely different to you, the small-minded ignorance that perpetuated the age. It’s an uncomfortable watch at occasions, serving because it does as a reminder of attitudes that whereas largely improved, haven’t completely been overcome in 2023.
To Mortgage’s credit score, there are moments of sunshine reduction to light up these of gloom and the work is closely punctuated with comedy and a few creative motion sequences.
The ensemble forged are universally robust, and whereas typically a bit of caricatured in driving residence the narrative, they efficiently breathe life into these very actual tales.
Completely gripping and hauntingly acquainted, Moorcroft is a surprising piece of labor from Eilidh Mortgage, we are able to solely wait with bated breath to see what’s subsequent from this gifted playwright.
