The Stage

Midsummer (A Play with Songs)

Published Friday 22 October 2010 at 11:25 by Thom Dibdin

Funny and touching, David Greig’s Edinburgh-set two-hander, which has been revived for the Traverse theatre’s main stage and an international tour, is as thoroughly entertaining as it ever was. Indeed, with extra space to breath, Cora Bissett and Matthew Pidgeon have found even greater depths of poignancy and humour, largely because they have kept the crisp discipline to their storytelling which helped make the original production such a hit.

Matthew Pidgeon and Cora Bissett in Midsummer (A Play with Songs) at the Traverse, Edinburgh Photo: Douglas Robertson

Reprising the roles they helped create, Bissett plays stood-up divorce lawyer Helen and Pidgeon is petty-criminal “medium” Bob, who Helen picks up on a wet midsummer weekend while he is waiting for a contact in a wine-bar. Breaking out from the angular frame of the double bed which sits centre stage, they deconstruct and reconstruct that weekend, taking on the roles of the various side-characters and picking up guitars to drop easily into Gordon McIntyre’s wistful songs, which comment on and add emotional depth to the characters.

This is easy and captivating theatre, which speaks of lost youth and remembering not to regret things done, only those things not done. As the angst-ridden non-couple, just reaching 35 and denying their mid-life crisis, Bissett and Pidgeon stride through it all. Working from out from Georgia McGuinness’ tight geometric set that surrounds the central bed, they create the Edinburgh backdrop so vividly that there is no need to know the city’s named nooks and crannies to get their resonances.

The occasional flaws to the plotting and geography which muddied the clarity of previous productions have been ironed out, while the cultural references remain universal. With Bissett and Pidgeon giving a real spontaneity to their performances, this is a bright, imaginative and fresh piece of theatre.