On Common Ground Reviews

The first performances of our Festival 2014 event On Common Ground took place on Friday and Saturday this week, and the reviews have appeared in the press this morning.

Herald review 4*: “At times visually stunning, it was also incredibly moving as a huge sense of pride in our city emanated from the local cast” 

The Scotsman review 4*: [Janis] Hart’s design and Karen MacIver’s soudtrack come together to support performances which ring with pride and passion. It reminds us that what matters at least as much as hearing the stories of other is having the opportunity to tell your own.” 

We've also been asking On Common Ground audiences what they thought about the show, and have had some brilliant comments from them too. 

"a wonderful performance, inspired production and great focus from superb cast"

"An amazing amount of work obviously went into the show and the live music was great" 

"A wonderful unique experience" 

There are performances on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday of this week. The tickets have all been allocated, however we will run a returns queue each night to re-allocate any tickets that haven't been collected. You'll be able to add your name to the list for returns from 6pm each night, with uncollected tickets reallocated from 7.15pm. While you wait, there are films to enjoy in the auditorium, as well as arts and crafts from Debajehmujig's home on Manitoulin Island in the foyer.

If you attended On Common Ground, and want to let us know what you thought of the show, you can complete a survey online Surveys completed by Fri 22 August with contact details submitted will be entered into a free prize draw for a £50 Buchanan Galleries gift card.

Find out more about the show on the On Common Ground website.

Arriving On Common Ground

After months of preparation, planning, emails and Skype calls,  Debajehmujig Storytellers finally arrived in Glasgow last week to begin the rehearsals for our Festival 2014 event, On Common Ground, a free, outdoor spectacle celebrating life in the Gorbals and First Nation traditions and customs.

Debajehmujig Storyteller Bruce Naokwegijig making an offering to the Clyde

Seat Sale Saturday

Bag a piece of history with your very own Citizens seat by coming along to our seat sale. 

Last summer, dozens of bargain-hunters took the chance to own their very own piece of Citizens history when we replaced the seats in the stalls and offered the old seats for sale.

A happy customer with his bargain souvenir. Check our more pics from the 2013 sale on Flickr

Sports Day memories

We asked some of the people involved in Sports Day to share some of their sporting opinions with us. School sports teachers seem to have a lot to answer for - both good and bad!

 Find out more information about Sports Day on our website, and book tickets online.

Extracts from Sports Day

Sports Day is a collection of stories jointly penned by some of Scotland's finest writers. Here are two extracts from the play.

Find out more information on our website, or book tickets online.

Powerful plays, defining drama and black comedy - Autumn 2014 season launched

From great Danes to Glasgow gunmen and Christmas curmudgeons, we have lots of entertainment on offer in our newly launched Autumn 2014 season.

Read on for the full lineup and book your theatre fix now!

What's On - Book Online

 

Crime and Punishment most nominated show at 2014 Critics’ Award for Theatre in Scotland

We are so pleased to be hosting the 2014 Critics’ Award for Theatre in Scotland (CATS), which are taking place in the Citizens Theatre’s beautiful Main House on 8 June.

We are even more delighted that last year’s production of Crime and Punishment, produced in partnership with the Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh, and Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse, has received 6 nominations. This makes Crime and Punishment the most nominated production in this year’s Awards!

Don't Put Your Mother on the Stage Mrs Worthington...

Loretta Scott is one of the 'supernumeries' in The Libertine, commonly called an 'extra'. Loretta had never acted on a professional stage before the opening night on Saturday 3 May, and as she says in her blog here, it is not something she will forget in a hurry!

See Loretta and the rest of the cast in The Libertine until Sat 24 May. Find out more about the play and book online.

Sunday 4th May

When my daughter Mary-Claire gave me classes at the Citizens Theatre Nightschool for my 60th birthday, neither of us could have anticipated this moment – my first night in front of an audience, performing in The Libertine. To have this fantastic opportunity to be involved in a Citizens performance with professional actors, and to build on the acting skills developed at Nightschool by working with Dominic Hill (Director) and Danielle McIlven (Assistant Director), well, it’s a bit of a dream come true...!

A Writer's Diary of His Journey with The Libertine

From a curious introduction to the Earl of Rochester, Stephen Jeffreys has lived with this larger-than-life character for nearly 40 years. The Libertine first swaggered on to stage in 1994 and since then he has been to the New World, been played by Johnny Depp, and has finally arrived at the Citizens Theatre in a re-write that Jeffreys is calling 'The definitive version'.

Read Stephen's 'intermittent' diary below, and see the Earl on stage here.



1975  
A visit to my dentist Gerald Lightman provides me with a surprise present. Gerald, a cultivated chap with interests in music and literature, is clearing his bookshelves of any matter unsuitable for his inquisitive thirteen year old daughter. One item up for relocation is a green Olympia press edition of Sodom, a play by John Wilmot, the second Earl of Rochester. Working through his list of patients, Gerald concludes that I would be the most appropriate recipient for the book and hands it over. On reading Sodom, I realise that, despite an early exposure to the work of the Pip Simmons Theatre Company and Michael McClure, this is quite the filthiest play I have ever read, featuring extensive bouts of buggery, fornication and other practices (including, at one point, some pornographic topiary). The volume features a skeletal biography of Rochester which gives an account of the Earl’s short, restless life, his poetry and his battles with Charles II. I add Wilmot to my mental inventory of approved people and resume my life as a supply teacher in Hackney.

The Beautiful Cosmos of Ivor Cutler - Who Is Ivor Cutler?

Who is Ivor Cutler?

By Fiona Shepherd
From National Theatre Of Scotland



"It is up to you whether you read this...my advice is just to ignore it" 
– Ivor Cutler


Some know him as the lugubrious bus conductor Buster Bloodvessel in The Beatles’ Magical Mystery Tour; others as the self-styled “stupid genius” who recorded more John Peel sessions than any other act, bar The Fall. It is reckoned that he was the only artist to have featured on Radios 1, 2, 3 and 4 – a renaissance man, but with cult appeal.