David Greig / National Theatre of Scotland: The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart

David Greig / National Theatre of Scotland: The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart

David Greig / National Theatre of Scotland: The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart

Folk legend has it that the ‘devil’s ceilidh’ opens up a chink of time at midnight on midwinter’s eve. Into this falls a 28 year-old postgraduate student called Prudencia Hart. Despite her supposed expertise in the topography of hell in Scottish balladry, she is caught unawares and spends four millennia looking out from a bed and breakfast onto the Asda car park.

Prudencia has dived head first into the devil’s lair after refusing tea, chips, television, vodka, cigarettes and photos from a friendly dead woman on an estate near Kelso in the Scottish borders. She finally escapes after seducing Satan, and is rescued by the one and only Colin Syme on the same snowy evening.

This tale of music and maidenhood spans the highbrow and lowbrow. It includes an extended satire of academia, from the post-post-structuralist with a Freudian take on the Tweed to the post-prandial conference snooze. At the same time, it enables the audience to discover their inner football chanter. The clapping and singalong provide directed but genuine participation, although some of the physical jokes are a bit slapstick.

The performance benefits from an imposing setting in the pub Ghillie Dhu. It’s pretty site-specific, as the scenes include a lock-in with folk music. Call me cheap, but I also enjoyed the free whisky and what was left of the sandwiches during the interval. Seriously, it has the high production values of the National Theatre of Scotland and the Traverse, and offers authentic Scots culture and hospitality.

But to put it simply, the music and acting are superb. Alasdair Macrae leads five wonderful voices with gusto, drawing out instrumental, solo and ensemble performances that are pitch perfect. Madeleine Worrall revels in Prudencia’s prudishness that matures into a startlingly sophisticated rendition of Kylie Minogue’s ‘Can’t Get You Out of My Head’. David McKay as the devil and Andy Clark as Colin are excellent counterparts, with Annie Grace completing the talented quintet.

The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart remains deeply literary. Although it’s genuinely rooted in folk culture, references to traditions like physical theatre are relatively slight. It is artfully but successfully constructed, providing another bright feather in the festival’s cap.

www.nationaltheatrescotland.com