Burning up for the bard

I caught Loving Burns, a Edinburgh Fringe 2008 event, mainly because I like poet Robert Burns and next year is his 250th death anniversary.

How could I not attend a play about the national poet of Scotland?

Held at a really small room at the Roxburghe Hotel, near the book festival venue of Charlotte Square, Loving Burns by RedHed Theatre started off well.

It had all of two actresses — Alice Devine and Patricia Mullin — who played between them eight characters. The scene change had costume changes too, and the two women were constantly going behind the white screens to change. And, the white screens would shake!

Some of the characters had strong Scottish brogues, which made some of the dialogue — for me — hard to follow. In fact, sometimes the lines sounded as if spoken in Tamil.

There was some beautiful soprano singing by Devine.

The play was about the women in Burns’ life. His wife, Jean Armour, who “felt the heat of him”, and his many other lovers including the servant girl.

But I never saw the end of the play as it was ended by a fire alarm. And so we were left — five patrons, two actresses and three assistants — standing on the sidewalk. So true to Burns. He died at an untimely age of 35, before he could really love or live.

A few of us adjourned to a nearby pub for some fine Scotch to better mull over the incident and play.