Sea and Land and Sky

Synopsis

1916. Three young women from the Scottish Women’s Hospital are sent to the Russian front to support the war effort. Ailsa is working class and determined to make an impression on her superiors, Millicent is a self-confessed hedonist and Lily is searching for her lost husband. Unprepared for what they witness, each must find a way of coping as they fight to survive an experience that will change them forever... Poetic, visionary and startlingly written, Abigail Docherty’s historical play is based on actual diaries of young Scottish nurses who experienced the Great War. Often darkly funny and raw in its emotions, Sea and Land and Sky is a gripping and sensual tale of youth, war, memory - and the power of love.

Our Review:

18 October 2010

Sea and Land and Sky, Abigail Docherty’s winning entry to the Tron’s Open Stage playwriting competition, is sure to become a great example of contemporary Scottish theatre.

Constructed around the diaries of Scottish nurses on the Russian Front during the Great War, Docherty’s script is a pounding, relentless reckoning of mankind’s inability to comprehend the trauma of human conflict. Like Macbeth, the nurses are driven mad by the rising seas of blood which fill the trenches, turning rules to ruins and preservation to desecration.

Director Andy Arnold’s cast of soldiers and nurses is uniformly excellent. Former River City actors Laura McMonagle and Carmen Pieraccini convincingly bear the crutch of insanity alongside Mairi Phillips, challenging the Florence Nightingale image of nurses in wartime with raw sexuality and loss of control.

Hazel Blue’s set design is fascinating. A frozen waste of dirt piles, ...

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