The original cast of Sunset Song.
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Aberdeen Song & Darlings Head for Edinburgh Fringe

Aberdeen Performing Arts (APA) has been invited to take its two productions – Sunset Song and The Silver Darlings – to this year’s Edinburgh Fringe Festival. The acclaimed plays will run at the Assembly Rooms, for three weeks in August and will be part of Assembly Theatre’s 30th anniversary celebrations.

Aberdeen audiences are to get the chance to catch the productions once again, with a week of pre-festival performances at His Majesty’s Theatre from 21 July. The invitation to take the productions to the Edinburgh Fringe is a coup for APA coming less than three years since the company began producing work on a large scale.

APA chief executive and producer for both shows, Duncan Hendry, said he was delighted and proud to be taking the productions to the festival. He commented: "It's Assembly Theatre's 30th anniversary and they are planning to put on the best of Scottish theatre at The Assembly Rooms this year. Our productions will be their mainstay in the biggest of their spaces within their George Street venue.

Mr Hendry continued: "We were approached by Assembly Theatre, to take these productions to the Fringe - they had seen them when they were touring last year and the year before and were obviously impressed. I think that is a great compliment to the people who have been working on these productions that they will be showcased in this way, at the world’s largest arts festival."

Mr Hendry added that both plays - Lewis Grassic Gibbon's Sunset Song, adapted by Alastair Cording, and Neil M Gunn's The Silver Darlings adapted by Peter Arnott - are iconic Scottish stories; huge narrative works that explore the massive themes of land and sea.”

APA are confident that the epic stories will work well in Edinburgh, and could work well internationally. The company hopes to use the festival to showcase the works to the international promoters and producers who attend the Festival.

Assembly Theatre artistic director William Burdett-Coutts said: “Assembly aims to set the standard from major drama at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and we are delighted to be working with Aberdeen Performing Arts to bring two great Scottish plays to the festival taken from two fantastic books.”

- by Joseph Pike

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