Theatre reviews: The Long Drop | The Corinthian

The Long Drop, Citizens’ Theatre, Glasgow ★★★★★

The Corinthian, Assembly Roxy, Edinburgh ★★★★

Sitting just yards south of the Clyde, in what was once the teeming tenement Gorbals, the Citizens’ Theatre has been at the heart of Glasgow’s ever-shifting human landscape for the last 150 years; and this week, it opened one of those shows that directly confronts the city's history, or a key episode from it.

The Long Drop first appeared in 2017, as a novel by the great Glasgow writer Denise Mina based on the Peter Manuel murder trial of 1958; but now, it has been adapted by playwright Linda McLean into a magnificent, brooding film noir of a stage play, built around the legend of a night-long drinking session in a series of Glasgow bars shared by Peter Manuel and William Watt, the Glasgow businessman whose wife, daughter and sister-in-law Manuel was eventually convicted of murdering.

As the play begins, Watt appears simply as a hard-drinking businessman desperate to clear his name, since he has initially been suspected of the murders, and held on remand in Barlinnie; he believes Manuel’s claim to know the identity of the real killer.

As it evolves, though, the show’s landscape shifts from black heist-movie comedy to something murkier and more disturbing, laced with glimpses of Watt’s close contacts in the badlands between business, crime and the law; a complicity that gradually makes a bitter mockery of his claim to be a man who has “never done anything wrong in my life.”

All of this is magnificently captured in Dominic Hill’s superbly dark and knowing production, set by designer Jen McGinley in a wood-lined, smoke-stained space that becomes both pub and courtroom, and brought to life by a superb cast, led by Keith Fleming as a terrifyingly self-deceiving Watt, and a chilling Brian Vernel as Manuel, a smart psychopath who simply loves to kill.

What makes The Long Drop exceptional, though, is the extent to which those two leading performances are borne along on a brilliant tide of Glasgow comedy, tragedy and horror evoked by the supporting cast of Andy Clark, Martin Donaghy, George Drennan, Mary Gapinski and Robert Jack, each playing a kaleidoscope of roles with fantastic precision and style. And if the writing and acting are superb, they are fully matched by the brooding brilliance of the show’s design, lighting, music, movement and sound, by Jen McGinley, Stuart Jenkins, Nikola Kodjabashia and others; in a tale imprinted forever on Glasgow’s collective memory, and now reimagined at the Citizens’ with wit, skill, high intelligence, and the steely collective courage it takes, to confront hard truths.

As it chances, last week’s Play, Pie, Pint show The Corinthian - now playing at Assembly Roxy in Edinburgh - is an almost perfect 55-minute companion piece to The Long Drop; a powerful monologue by Joe McCann that seeks to capture the life and spirit of Arthur Watson, the first ever black international footballer, who captained Scotland to a famous 6-1 victory over England in 1881. Watson was the son of a white Scottish plantation owner in Demerara who married a black woman of African descent, and brought her and their son back to live with him in middle-class Glasgow, where they became a kind of litmus test for racism, and even racist violence, in 19th century Scotland.

READ MORE: Edinburgh Children's Festival reviews: Toto Kerblammo! | Brrr | Gretel

As Watson, Dayton Mungai delivers an astonishing performance that speaks eloquently not only of the dignity shown by many victims of racism in the UK - not least in this past week - but also of the sources of that dignity in deep thought about how to live with such aggression, and how to value the support of those who reject those attitudes; in a show which is timely both in casting a light on the intensely political World Cup now kicking off in the Americas, and in its rich affirmation of our shared humanity, at a moment when, to our shame, that affirmation still seems not only welcome, but necessary.

The Long Drop is at the Citizens’ Theatre, Glasgow, until 20 June; The Corinthian is at Assembly Roxy, Edinburgh, until Sunday 14 June.

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