A Kick Up The Arts with Nicola Meighan

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I’m revisiting a legendary old place of work in this episode, as I go back to Glasgow’s Tron Theatre to hear about a bold, fresh, and contemporary take on Sophocles’ epic Greek tragedy, Antigone…
Lulu Raczka’s fired-up reimagining of the classic text is directed by Finn den Hertog, whose credits include Pitlochry Festival Theatre’s Lear, Dundee Rep and the Royal Lyceum’s Sunset Song, and the Fifth Step with the National Theatre of Scotland…
Finn’s first production for The Tron promises to be a thrilling two-hander - as two wild sisters fight for justice - thanks to actor, writer and director Eilidh Loan, who plays Antigone - you might have seen her in roles from Murder on the Heath and Doctor Who to A Castle for Christmas and Macbeth - or you might have caught her second play, Cathy, starring Elaine C Smith, at the Traverse during the Edinburgh Festival - it was wonderful…
Holly Howden Gilchrist, who stars as her sister, Ismene, last bowled over Tron audiences in A Giant from the Bridge, and has also been terrific in Twelfth Night, Small Acts of Love, and more…
Antigone, in association with Groupwork, opens on September 18 and runs till October 10, so move fast if you fancy getting along… I caught up with Holly, Eilidh and Finn in rehearsals last week, and we chatted more about what to expect - from sibling love - and sacrifice - to sticks of rock and maybe even conga lines… Then again - probably not..

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I’m hearing from two brilliant women, and minds, who’ve joined forces to explore a wild - and under-documented, and misunderstood - chapter in Scottish history… 
In their superb new novella, This Door of the Seas, best-selling writer Val McDermid has teamed up with Geographer Royal for Scotland Jo Sharp - they’re partners in crime, and partners in life - as they trace the journey and tale of the Darien venture… 
It saw more than 2000 Scots sail into the unknown at the end of the seventeenth century, toward a horizon of hope and prosperity - but the challenges of Darien’s jungle-coastline, at the junction of North and South America, transpired to offer anything but that. 
It would eventually upturn the future of Scotland, bankrupting an already impoverished nation, and propelling it towards political union with England… 
This Door of the Seas is the latest in Birlinn’s excellent Darkland Tales, in which some of Scotland’s best-loved writers re-imagine stories from Scottish history, myth and legend through a contemporary lens - Val and I chatted about her Queen Macbeth Darkland Tale on a previous episode of A Kick Up The Arts…
Val and Jo’s book is written as a series of letters home from expedition scientist Dr James Wallace - as addressed to his wife Eliza and to Sir Robert Sibbald, the very first Geographer Royal - and as uncovered by his ancestor, Beth Wallace, in the Spring of 2026...
Val and Jo came through to Bridge of Allan to tell me all about it...

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As we charge headlong into a month of madness at the Edinburgh Festivals, I’m joined by Scottish theatre revolutionaries Grid Iron to chat about their Fringe adaptation of Andrew O’Hagan’s Mayflies; and about their 30 years - and counting - of bringing brilliant drama to our stages, and beyond…
When Andrew launched Mayflies back in 2020, the novel’s tale of friendship, masculinity, youth, getting older and mortality - played out to a glorious 80s indie soundtrack - floored so many of us; as did Andrea Gibb’s TV adaptation, with Tony Curran and Martin Compston in the starring roles, as Tully, and Jimmy - aka Noodles…
We meet them as young men in Ayrshire, and then again in later life, faced with a devastating diagnosis - and an impossible choice…
As well as raising the roof in venues with shows like June Carter Cash - in cahoots with the National Theatre of Scotland - Grid Iron’s world-renowned site-specific theatre has included underground promenade trips like The Bloody Chamber, while their earlier reflection on young men, friendship and 1980s Ayrshire - Decky Does A Bronco - started life in a Paisley park… 
Mayflies is being staged in a converted warehouse, Brown’s of Leith - as adapted and directed by Ben Harrison, produced by Jude Doherty, and soundtracked by the legendary DPJ, aka David Paul Jones. 
I caught up with Ben, and Jude, to reflect on Mayflies, and three decades of Grid Iron…

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I’m in conversation with one of our most thrilling writers, and humans, Michael Pedersen, live from the wonderful Bookmonger in Bearsden… 
Michael’s the Edinburgh makar, and a veritable cultural livewire, whose glorious poetry collections include The Cat Prince and Oyster. His prose calling card, Boy Friends, was published to huge acclaim in 2022, and the paperback edition of his utterly magical debut novel, Muckle Flugga, is out now.
It’s stunning and tender, it’s a beacon of hope, it’s brimming with love, and life, and nature;  it’s kindled by friendship, coddled in knitwear, rooted in landscape, charged by starlight. 
Just before we get to the chat - and thanks so much if you joined us in the lovely audience - I’m back with The Bookmonger in conversation with the brilliant Damian Barr about The Two Roberts, although we’re breaking out of the bookshop and holding that at Glasgow’s Royal College in St Vincent Street, on September 25th…
Before that, Michael’s at Edinburgh International Book Festival with various former A Kick Up The Arts guests and wonders, including Gordon Buchanan and Hollie McNish - I’ll put a link to all the dates online… 
And I’ll be at EIBF too, hosting various parties in The Spiegeltent - come for A Kick Up The Arts with live music and conversation from Kathryn Joseph, Kirstin Innes and Lomond Campbell - that’s on August 25th (tickets here), and I’m also variously in conversation with The Beta Band’s Steve Mason, Val McDermid, Justin Currie, and Grant McPhee across the week - I’ll tell you more about that soon…
For now though - to the Bookmonger, and Michael, and Muckle Flugga…

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I’m back in my Stirling local, the Golden Lion, for a whistle-stop tour of this year’s programme for Bloody Scotland International Crime Writing Festival, which launched a couple of days ago, and which runs from September 18th to 20th.
After Thursday’s big announcements, and a conversation I chaired with the always-entertaining JD Kirk, I sat down with this year’s Bloody Scotland guest programmer, Denise Mina, festival director Bob McDevitt and best-selling author and board member Craig Robertson - along with two of the brilliant writers shortlisted for this year’s prestigious debut prize - Linda Duncan McLaughlin, for Original Sins - and May Rinaldi, for Liar Thief…
We had a blether about this year’s line-up, which as ever includes unmissable book events, along with site-specific theatre, karaoke, courtroom drama, and incredible guests - along with new-writing initiatives like Crime in the Spotlight and Pitch Perfect, and the announcement of the gilded debut prize, and the McIlvanney Prize for crime fiction book of the year… 
I’m a McIlvanney Prize judge again, and we’ll chat more about all that soon enough, but for now, here’s a sense of what to expect if you come to this year’s Bloody Scotland in September… Which you totally should…