Alan Cumming to reprise iconic High Life role in major new 'unashamedly Scottish' musical 'romp'

It was a hit Scottish series that ran for just six episodes and a pilot, gaining cult status before being axed due to one of its stars’ burgeoning Hollywood career.

Now Alan Cumming and Forbes Masson are to reprise their original High Life roles in an “unashamedly Scottish” stage musical version of the cult 1990s TV series.

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Mr Cumming and Mr Masson will star as Sebastian Flight and Steve McCracken in High Life The Musical, which will tour Scotland next year. Siobhan Redmond and Patrick Ryecart will also star as Shona Spurtle and Captain Hilary Duff.

The High Life was first commissioned and broadcast by the BBC 30 years ago, created by and featuring Mr Cumming and Mr Masson, who met as students at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama, now the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.

Taking place in the fictional Air Scotia airline flying out of Prestwick Airport, the High Life centres around air stewards Steve, Sebastian and Shona.

Launched as an initial pilot in 1994 and a series of six episodes which were broadcast in early 1995, it was understood a second series was never made due to Mr Cumming’s increasingly successful career, which has seen him act in productions including James Bond hit Golden Eye and TV show The Good Wife. He has also hosted the US version of The Traitors, filmed in Scotland.

Alan Cumming on the ideas behind the play

Mr Cumming and Mr Masson told The Scotsman the idea to create the play initially came from the National Theatre of Scotland, which has commissioned the production.

“It's a really good idea, it makes total sense,” says Mr Cumming. “A Scottish property that was loved, turning it into a theatrical version of that, it’s a no brainer.”

However, years passed and the pair admit they “didn’t get it together”, until a chance meeting with Scottish stage writer Jonny McKnight created the “spark” that saw the project come to fruition.

“I was doing a show in Glasgow and Forbes came to see it the same night as Johnny McKnight came to see it,” recalls Mr Cumming.

“We had such a laugh, the three of us. It was such fun. Then the next day, Johnny called me up said ‘hey, have you guys ever thought of doing a musical of the High Life?’

“I said ‘you know what, we have, Johnny. And would you like to help us write it?’”

The production will be touring Scotland in spring 2026, with previews and opening performance at Dundee Rep Theatre from March 28, the onward touring to HMT Aberdeen, Festival Theatre, Edinburgh, Eden Court Theatre and King’s Theatre Glasgow until 18 May 2026.

The stage show, which will feature new and original music, focuses on the sale of Air Scotia.

Close to the original?

Mr Cumming hopes the musical will retain the “bit scrappy, bit surreal” atmosphere of the original show, but admitted some more serious issues are touched upon, due to Flight and McCracken’s more mature age.

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He says: “People are obviously coming with reminisce and fondness. People really love it, so I think they will be coming with that love, but also to see what [the characters] are up to now.”

Both characters still work as air stewards, but Mr Masson admits their advancing age has changed the focus of the show.

“Both of the main protagonists, Steve and Sebastian, are now over 60, so there are all the things that come with that, and all of the reminiscences and the sudden realisation that their lives are now in their autumn years,” he says.

“Scotland has changed as well [since the original show] and it’s about how the characters embrace the present and the future, but also remember what the past taught us. Age is a big theme in it.”

Mr Cumming adds: “It's a celebration of a show that was a huge success 30 years ago. We're doing in a different form. We're older, we're coming back together.”

Modern tweaks to an old show

He says he was “surprised by how little” material was “potentially offensive”, 30 years later, but admits that some cultural references have had to be updated, recalling a part in the script that mentioned a Stanley cup - the cult water bottle propelled to fame on social media.

“Neither of us had any idea what that was,” he admits.

The pair, who began their working life together when they formed comedy double act Victor and Barry in 1982, describe the concept as “really surreal”, and “unashamedly Scottish”.

They describe the new show as a “romp”, freed of restrictions implemented on the original series by the London-based BBC.

“It’s that long Scottish tradition of surreal comedy,” Mr Masson says. “And the show is really bonkers.

“We're playing with silly ideas and it's great that we can be unashamedly Scottish, because it's a Scottish tour, it's a Scottish show. We're not having to water it down in any way, as we had to do slightly when we did the TV show.

“We stood our ground, but because the TV show was made in London, there was a lot of things that London people didn't understand. And that was quite good, in a way, because they didn't understand a lot of the swearing.”

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Mr Cumming adds: “I think we are leaning into our Scottishness a bit more than we would have done.”

Recently chronicled in the book Victor and Barry’s Kelvinside Compendium – A Meander Down Memory Close, a 40th-anniversary celebration of their birth, Mr Cumming and Mr Masson’s original characters were morphed into the High Life’s Steve and Sebastian.

As well as cult fans of the show, Mr Cumming and Mr Masson hope to attract a new audience too young to remember it the first time around.

However, they say they are unlikely to do future High Life spin-offs - although don’t rule out working together in the future.

“Neither Alan nor myself would be very keen to keep doing the same thing over and over again,” says Mr Masson. “We always challenge ourselves and there may be something in the future that we both want to do together, but I don't necessarily think it might be more of this. But who knows?”