OPENING SOON / The Straw Chair – Finborough Theatre

“There is a lesson you should learn from your stay on Hirta: the danger of being too troublesome a wife.”

In a production commissioned by the Finborough Theatre, the English premiere of The Straw Chair by award-winning Scottish playwright Sue Glover opens at the Finborough Theatre for a four week limited season on Tuesday, 4 January 2022 (Press Nights: Thursday, 6 January 2022 and Friday, 7 January 2022 at 7.30pm).

In 1735 – Isabel, barely seventeen, is sent from Edinburgh and the life she has always known, to live with her new husband on Gaelic-speaking St Kilda, an island on the furthest edges of the Outer Hebrides, in the storm-tossed waters of the Atlantic Ocean.

Struggling to adapt to island life, Isabel meets Rachel – a wild, seemingly mad woman, shunned by the local inhabitants. Over time, Isabel learns that Rachel is none other than the infamous Lady Grange, kidnapped by her husband following their bitter divorce and long imprisoned on the island. Lady Grange clings with tragic dignity to the two things she has left in the world – a consuming rage and an old straw chair.Inspired by a true story, The Straw Chair is a modern Scottish classic, exploring liberty, marriage, madness and incarceration, and female empowerment, against the backdrop of the lost way of life of the Western Isles.

Jenny Lee will be performing in this new revival.

First performed in 1988 at the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh, in a co-production between Focus Theatre and the Traverse, and revived on an extensive Scottish tour in 2015, The Straw Chair finally receives its English premiere at the Finborough Theatre.

THE CREATIVES

THE STRAW CHAIR
by Sue Glover.

• Directed by Polly Creed.
• Associate Direction by Imy Wyatt-Corner.
• Set Design by Alex Marker.
• Costume Design by Carla Joy Evans.
• Lighting by Claire Childs.
• Sound Design by Anna Short.
• Musical Direction by Rori Hawthorn.

Presented by True Name Productions in association with Neil McPherson for the Finborough Theatre.

Cast:

• Rori Hawthorn.
• Nicholas Karimi.
• Jenny Lee.
• Siobhan Redmond.

Author: Paul HegartyPaul is a reviewer and an experienced actor who has performed extensively in the West End (Olivier nominated) and has worked in TV, radio and a range of provincial theatres. He is also a speech, drama and communications examiner for Trinity College London, having directed productions for both students and professionals and if not busy with all that he is then a teacher of English.