Robert Dawson Scott
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It is an unalloyed pleasure to discover fresh talent. On the evidence of this, his first full-length, fully staged play, D.C. Jackson, from Ayrshire, is going to be a voice to be reckoned with.
A coming-of-age play set over a few days of the summer holidays in the nondescript village of Stewarton in Ayrshire, The Wall is both rooted in its own territory and ambitiously universal. The titular chunk of masonry is a place where teenagers hang out when the alternatives are the swings, the “duckie” (a noxious-sounding local pond) or “going up the shop”.
It is parliament, hustings, trysting place and refuge for the four teenagers with a hatful of hormones and waiting for exam results to arrive and life to begin. Jackson is now 28, but he is probably young enough to remember first-hand what that was like. As the 14-year-old Norma complains: “I hated being wee, but being big is shite.” But he also has an ear for dialogue that many more experienced writers would kill for.
In one sense, it is all pretty inconsequential; Norma's big brother Barry is convinced that Michelle, the girl he would like to get off with, is in fact his sister as a result of an indiscretion by his father 16 years ago. Meanwhile, Norma has nicked a sliver of hash from their dad's stash and given it for safekeeping to the local ned, Rab, who in turn is hopelessly pursuing the local shop owner's daughter (“She doesn't do PE because she's an Islam, lucky cow,” observes Norma, a young Mrs Malaprop in the making).
But then teenagers do obsess about inconsequential details. And at least this lot are not predictable sink-estate deadbeats; they're just ordinary kids waiting for their Higher results and growing up in small-town Scotland. It is funny and true and hugely enjoyable.
Nor is it just Jackson who is giving notice of new talent here. The four performers, Scott Hoatson, Kirstin McLean, Finn den Hertog and, best of all, Sally Reid as Norma, are all first-rate in Gregory Thompson's nicely judged production for Borderline.
Perhaps the most telling indicator is that, with only a handful of previews last week, the theatre was already full of that near mythical demographic, teenagers and young adults, who were clearly delighted to be seeing something to which they could relate directly.
Box office: 0141-552 4267, to tomorrow, then touring Scotland until April 12
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