From knitting underwear for Everest to Bingo hall gossip: the Borders stories brought to life on stage
The project takes local stories to turn into plays
Knitting underwear for an Everest expedition, the goings on in a cold war bunker and the gossip in the bingo hall are among the stories inspired by the heritage and people of the Scottish Borders being brought to the stage in a community theatre project.
Untold Stories will see participants seek out tales from the town to use as inspiration for scripted performances which will be developed and performed in Hawick.
Meanwhile, the life and times of local racing legend Jimmi Guthrie and David Bowie’s one and only performance at Hawick Town Hall will also be included in the final performance at the Heart of Hawick theatre.
The project, led by Live Borders and supported by Hawick CARS Scheme and the Buccleuch Trust, will see stories improvised and turned into final scripts by local theatre makers Ellie Zeegan and Clare Prenton.
The new plays will be published in a book along with archival and contemporary photographs of the featured buildings and places that inspired the writers and cast.
Jason Moyes, head of arts and creativity at Live Borders, said: "We wanted to reflect Hawick's culture, history and heritage through a series of short plays and monologues based around the imagined stories of real people and real buildings in the town.”
"Our theatre is in a converted Victorian Spinning Mill complete with a 14-foot waterwheel, you can walk for five minutes from here in any direction and be in front of another amazing building packed with stories. For us at Live Borders, celebrating and safeguarding that heritage is incredibly important, and projects like this help bring those stories to life for new audiences. "
"We have a really nice mix of people, and after just 5 workshops, have scripts that the writers have research and written, and that are being acted out by our cast, with direction from two very established theatre makers."
He added: "It has been so satisfying to watch the group come together and take a creative approach to exploring our local history, and fascinating to see how a gem of an idea develops into a script and is played out on the stage."
"We hope that by letting people share those untold stories, it will inspire others to dig into the towns history and possibly find untold stories of their own."
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