Actor John Michie on playing a political heavyweight in new play set against indyref backdrop

Taggart and Rebus star will portray family figurehead

John Michie plays Scottish political heavyweight George Rennie in Group Portrait in a Summer Landscape. Picture: Fraser Band

It is only a few months since Taggart star John Michie swapped cities to step into the shoes of John Rebus.

Now he has swapped policing for politics in one of the first stage plays set against the backdrop of the Scottish independence referendum.

Almost a decade later, the debates and divisions during the dramatic run-up to the vote are set to be played out once again in two of Scotland’s leading theatres.

Group Portrait in a Summer Landscape will be premiered at Pitlochry Festival Theatre on 25 August.

And the actor will be taking centre stage as a Scottish political heavyweight at the head of a fractured family asked to gather at their country house in Perthshire for a reunion that turns into a dramatic reckoning where secrets will be exposed and truths will be told.

Michie, who was brought up in Edinburgh, is heading up a nine-strong cast in Group Portrait in a Summer Landscape as retired politics professor George Rennie, a long-time Labour Party supporter planning to vote for independence in the referendum.

Written by playwright Peter Arnott, it is being directed by David Greig, playwright and artistic director of the Royal Lyceum Theatre in Edinburgh.

Group Portrait in a Summer Landscape, which will run at Pitlochry Festival Theatre, from 25-28 August, before transferring to the Royal Lyceum from 4-14 October, is billed as “an exploration of a way of life that is coming to its end, a family struggling to connect in the wake of political pain, the experience of grief, and the beginnings, and endings of great love affairs.”

Sally Reid, John Michie, Deirdre Davis and Robbie Scott star in the new play Group Portrait in a Summer Landscape. Picture: Fraser Band

Arnott describes it as “an exploration of the complex history behind every family snapshot, in this instance, an ultra-liberal well-educated and well-fed Scottish family with a summer house in Perthshire."

A key element of the story is that Michie’s character knows he does not have long to live, but has kept his terminal illness quiet from the family and former students he has invited to gather for a weekend together in the summer of 2014.

The actor said: “George Rennis was an awkward bugger in the Labour Party for 40 years, he has been a bit of a revolutionary and a professor of politics at Glasgow University. He has been an intellectual and a bit of a mover and shaker. This weekend is a bit of a last hurrah for him.“He has always been an egotistical, difficult man and that’s not going to change even though he is on his last legs.

“He knows he is about to die and decides to bring together his best friends and his family, but does not tell them that he is on the way out.

John Michie plays Scottish political heavyweight George Rennie in Group Portrait in a Summer Landscape. Picture: Fraser Band

"He is re-evaluating his life so far and is trying to see the good in life and death.

"But when he gets his family and friends together it causes all sorts of problems.

“He creates this whole melting pot of relationships, keeps adding ingredients and stirs it up, thinking: ‘Let’s just see what happens.’

“It has the real feel of a Chekov play where not a lot happens but a hell of a lot happens emotionally. There is a lot of pain in it, but also a lot of dark humour.

Group Portrait in a Summer Landscape will be launched at Pitlochry Festival Theatre on 25 August.

Arnott describes his play as “a comedy about attractive, witty people looking into the face of the end of everything that they are, personally and as a group, coming to an end…and then looking away again as rapidly as possible.”

Michie says: “This family started off as quite sort of revolutionary socialists, who got successful in life. With that success came money, and with that money came a house in Glasgow and a house in the Perthshire countryside. But politically things are in flux and their lives are also in flux.

“The wonderful thing about the play is that there is a dramatic tension inherent in it because of the tensions that were there at the time within families and friends and still are there to an extent.

"The referendum is a massive thing for them. What does it mean for Scotland, the United Kingdom and the British State? All of that is mixed into this incredibly emotional, painful and funny weekend.

"George Rennie sees himself as someone who will question everything all the time. He is politically fluid, but is always awkward and always questioning. He is not just questioning politically, but also about life."

Michie, who has expressed support publicly for both the SNP and Labour, is coy about whether he supports Scottish independence.

Playwright Peter Arnott. Picture: Scott Taylor

He adds: “My own views have moved around. The great thing about democracy is that you are persuaded one way or the other. I had initially thought one way, then changed my mind. Now I am interested in everyone’s point of view.

"For the period of time I am doing this play my main concern is that my political views are the same as my character’s in order for it to be a truthful portrayal. I like to be a bit open and fluid about everything. You don’t want to be too set in your ways.”

Michie, who lives in London, says has relished returning home and being involved in a play with such a large ensemble cast, which will also includes Sally Reid, Nalini Chetty, Benny Young, Deirdre Davis, Matthew Trevannion, Keith Macpherson, Patricia Panther and Robbie Scott, even if i.

He said: “The play has changed radically, which is exciting but also unnerving.

There's been a lot of rewriting and restructuring. Half a dozen brand new scenes have gone in and half a dozen have come. We’ve not had the final draft yet, which is great fun when you’re trying to learn things!

“There is a whole new flashback element to the script that wasn’t there before.

“I’m loving working with David Greig. He’s very respectful about Peter’s writing, but he’s also been happy to nudge him and all of us in directions that we never thought were going to happen.”