Braw Clan presents The Needle Room by Martin Travers throughout rural venues in Clydesdale and Southern Scotland

Lanark, 1934. Despite her brutal upbringing, Rebecca McCrea has at all times believed in doing what’s proper. Now every thing goes improper.

As housekeeper of Castlepark, house of the rich Galbraith household, Rebecca has realized to handle the whims of her employers. She cooks, cleans and tries to make peace between matriarch Jessie and her bitterly estranged son, Duncan. But when Clydesdale is gripped by a vicious heatwave and Jessie’s well being immediately declines, horrible secrets and techniques erupt – and even Rebecca has one thing to cover. The bleak future she’s labored so arduous to flee is immediately on the doorstep, and he or she should make an unthinkable alternative.

The Needle Room is the third play from Braw Clan, the award-winning Scots language theatre firm primarily based in Biggar. Following the sell-out success of Secret Wrapped In Lead and So Long, Wee Moon, The Needle Room is a tense drama that pulls again the curtains of a grand Lanark villa to look at the cruelties imposed on girls by social expectations. Performed in Scots and English and accompanied by a staged studying of distinctive Thirties newspaper clippings that impressed the play, The Needle Room will premiere in Carnwath and tour to Lanark, Leadhills, Coulter, Crawfordjohn, Symington and Biggar from Wednesday 17 – Saturday 27 September. Official press efficiency: Saturday 20 September, 2.30pm or 7.30pm, St Nicholas Hall, Castlegate, Lanark, ML11 9DZ.

Written and produced by the award-winning playwright Martin Travers (So Long, Wee Moon, Whatever Happened To The Jaggy Nettles) and directed Ros Sydney (Pekku, Small Wonders) The Needle Room stars Fletcher Mathers (Castle Lennox) as Jessie, James Mackenzie (BBC Scotland’s Raven, Molly and Mack) as Duncan and Shannon Lynch (The Dodo Experiment) as Rebecca.

Tickets can be found at brawclan.com, and are priced on a Pay What You Decide foundation. Audience members determine what they need to pay after the efficiency. The play can be revealed by Bloomsbury and can be obtainable on the tour.

The Needle Room is fictional however set in Castlepark, an asymmetrical, Anglo-Japanese model villa constructed by William Leiper in 1880. Leiper was additionally liable for Templeton’s Carpet Factory close to Glasgow Green.

Owner Peter Thierfeldt mentioned: “Even though it’s right in the centre of Lanark, for years Castlepark was shrouded by overgrown holly trees and dense conifers, so that the outside world could only catch a glimpse of the “pagoda,” which is the distinctive stitching room proper atop the home. Castlepark appears to lend itself to tales, particularly mysterious ones. Learning that Martin needed to set The Needle Room right here, in an effort to create an exhilarating and vital play that highlights Lanark’s wealthy historical past, is a very thrilling second within the lengthy story of this property.”

Fletcher Mathers, who voiced ScotRail’s trains for 20 years and is a founding member of Braw Clan, mentioned: “I was in Braw Clan’s debut play, Secret Wrapped In Lead, in 2023. Before that first night in Leadhills, we didn’t know for certain whether a new theatre, in Scots, by a new company, touring to village halls across Clydesdale would work. But the response was incredible, and since then, Braw Clan has gone from strength to strength because rural people enjoy and support what we’re doing. The atmosphere is always electric. It will be a joy to tell Jessie’s story. She starts out as a Carnwath seamstress, marries very well and fights her way to the top of Clydesdale society. By the time we meet her, she’s a complicated person who’s keeping many secrets.”

Director Ros Sydney mentioned: “The Needle Room is one other brilliantly satisfying play by Martin Travers. Set in 1934, it’s darkly comedian and sings with full of life Scots language that creates a vivid world. The three characters reside in a time between two world wars, in a shifting political panorama the place custom clashes with new concepts. But by means of our trendy lens, the obstacles thrown at these characters are all too acquainted – obstacles of sophistication, gender, incapacity and sickness, trauma, concern of disgrace and rejection, and a determined grappling for energy. Braw Clan guarantees its audiences a cracking evening out: The Needle Room can be no exception.

Martin Travers, author of The Needle Room mentioned: “When I first climbed the dark creaking staircase to the sewing room at the top of Castlepark house, the hairs on the back of my neck told me I was entering a place stitched into the past. A sanctuary for someone who’s hiding from the world. The characters in The Needle Room are strong, complicated and driven. I feel lucky that Fletcher, James and Shannon are playing them, and can’t wait to see them breathe fire into Jessie, Duncan and Rebecca.”

TOURING DATES

Wednesday 17 September, 7.30pm, Carnwath Town Hall, 70 Main St, Carnwath, ML11 8JY

Friday 19 September, 7.30pm, St Nicholas Hall, Castlegate, Lanark, ML11 9DZ

Saturday 20 September, 2.30pm and 7.30pm, St Nicholas Hall, Castlegate, Lanark, ML11 9DZ

Tuesday 23 September, 7.30pm, Leadhills Village Hall, Ramsay Road, ML12 6YA

Wednesday 24 September, 7.30pm, Coulter Village Hall, Coulter, Biggar ML12 6PZ

Thursday 25 September, 7.30pm, Crawfordjohn Village Hall, Manse Rd, ML12 6SR

Friday 26 September, 7.30pm, Symington Village Hall, 55 Main Street, ML12 6LL

Saturday 27 September, 3pm and 7.30pm, Biggar Corn Exchange, 126 High St, ML12 6DL