Big Village are hungry to put on more top new one-act plays

NEW writing can be hit or miss – but a lot of fun to judge. Just ask the members of Edinburgh amateur drama club, Big Village.

Every two years the award-winning company hold the Big Village One-Act Play Writing Competition, an event which culminates with staging the best two entries, submitted from all over the UK.

This year, both winners – which can currently be seen at the Bedlam Theatre, Forrest Road – were penned by Edinburgh writers.

The winning submissions were chosen from 23 new plays read by a judging panel consisting of two of the Big Village committee and two company members. Together, the quartet whittled the 23 entries down to a shortlist of five, which they re-read before choosing a winner and runner-up.

Producer Jacqui McIntosh, one of the panel, recalls, "A great variety of plays were submitted this year. One was very strange, some were more adult than others, one, about disability, was very good but didn't have an ending and another was disqualified for having eight acts." Never a good thing in a one-act competition.

Also failing to make the grade was a play called Tokyo Time. Written for a cast of elderly ladies – in their 70s and 80s – and based around a reunion of the 1945 UK Olympic hockey team, it would have certainly been a challenge for Big Village to stage had it won.

"We would have had to recruit a lot of old ladies," laughs McIntosh, adding, "But there are a lot of enthusiastic people out there and with a little bit of work or more time spent on them, some of the entries might have made the Top Five.

"In fact, it was difficult to separate four of the short-listed plays, although the winner, Hungry Ghosts, was head and shoulders above the rest."

Described as a "powerful and gritty family drama" Hungry Ghosts is the work of Alistair Ferguson, a life member of the Scottish Community Drama Association (SCDA). It is set in a hospital side-ward, where the patriarch of a family appears to be dying an agonising death from cancer.

Donnie Gallagher will not go quietly. But while he clings to life, his son clings on to the past. And the truth is, some things never die.

Gallagher lived his life as an aggressive drunken bully, and now, his children gather to confront him, to condemn him and to find out why.

The second play, a quirky and imaginative comedy-drama called Oh Such A Hungry Yearning, by Alison Thirkell, is a contemporary piece that deals with the issue of body size.

Daisy Collins is a talented actress. She also just happens to be a million miles away from size zero. Surrounded by people who want her to change, Collins finds inspiration in the legendary Ginger Rogers.

Struggling to avoid being typecast by misogynistic ex-boyfriend directors, can Collins break through the barriers that are imposed by society and achieve self-fulfilment?

McIntosh, says, "We sincerely want to thank everyone who entered the competition. There always has to be a winner, though, and Alistair and Alison's work just had an extra edge.

"They are, of course, very different types of play – Hungry Ghosts is a very serious piece with laughs, while Oh Such A Hungry Yearning (a previous version of which was performed as a Radio 4 drama starring Julie T Wallace) has lots of laughs and is more of the sitcom ilk.

"However, put together I'm sure they will offer audiences a very enjoyable night out."

And, at the start of a new year, when better to make a date to enjoy the world premiere of not one but two new plays performed by Big Village, whose 2007 Fringe show, Almost Haunted, was commended in the Evening News Drama Awards.

• Hungry Ghosts/Oh Such A Hungry Yearning, Bedlam Theatre, Bristo Place, until Saturday, 7.30pm (Saturday matinee 2.30pm), £8, 0131-473 2000


STILL RUNNING

Goldilocks and the Three Bears *****
CHRISTMAS might seem a life-time ago, but Paul Elliott's sixth festive spectacular for Edinburgh continues at the King's Theatre, which has been transformed into Gertie's Big Top for the first ever circus pantomime.

Meet Goldilocks, baby bear, mummy bear and daddy bear, and prepare to boo the baddies.

Starring Scotland's best-known panto dame Allan Stewart and Raven star James Mackenzie, who are probably both glad that the panto season no longer runs until Easter, as it once did.

• King's Theatre, Leven Street, until January 20, various times, £8.50-£20.50, 0131-529 6000


Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat ***
The dream continues in more ways than one at the Edinburgh Playhouse where local boy Craig Chalmers leads a cast liberally sprinkled with reality TV stars in Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice's retelling of the Old Testament tale of Joseph and his jealous brothers.

With Dalkeith's Keith Jack as the first male Narrator in two decades and featuring all the old favourites such as Close Every Door To Me and Any Dream Will Do is it any surprise that the run has now been extended twice due to popular demand?

• Edinburgh Playhouse, Greenside Place, until January 19, various times, £9.50-£27.50, 08448-471 660