Preview: Bottleneck

RIOT Productions, formed during the production of Mercury Fur that hit St Andrews in March of this year, is bringing another production to St Andrews. This time the company is not looking to a dystopian future, but instead to the Hillsborough Disaster of 1989 with Bottleneck by Luke Barnes.

Under the direction of Jocelyn Cox, who has trained with the National Youth Theatre and at RADA alongside a whole host of Mermaids experience, RIOT aims to showcase contemporary, gritty pieces of theatre with which audiences will engage and come out of the theatre talking about what they have seen. It is from this aim that Bottleneck emerged. Coming about as a result of a number of factors – production constraints, an appreciation of Barnes’ writing, and the 25^th anniversary of the Hillsborough Disaster, in combination with the reopening of the inquest – Bottleneck aims to inspire conversation not only about the disaster itself, but the social issues that remain to this day that are featured in the play.

The play is not afraid to tackle difficult issues. Barnes was born and brought up in Liverpool and, as a result, the disaster has always been part of his heritage but in spite of this the play doesn’t shy away from offering up its own, somewhat controversial, viewpoint. At the heart of the play is the desire for audiences to leave asking questions, which is done using the story of Greg, a thirteen year old Liverpool supporter in 1989. Played by Frazer Hadfield – known to St Andrews audiences from productions as diverse as Angels in America, [title of show] and Mercury Fur amongst others – the play takes the form of a monologue; simply Greg telling us his story. It is through this voice that issues of class divisions, financial issues, stereotypes can, and indeed do, emerge in their turn allowing audiences to leave asking their own questions.

Whilst the play itself is interesting, the story of RIOT Productions itself too is an interesting one: over the course of Mercury Fur, a group of those involved – both acting and on the production team – decided that contemporary, socially engaged theatre was something they wanted to bring not only to St Andrews but to theatres outside our Bubble. It was from this that corporate funding was secured, advertising space in the Mercury Fur programme sold and a long term plan, involving this touring production of Bottleneck and the selection of Decade to take to Edinburgh Fringe Festival, was conceived. Too, RIOT are not creating productions that will only be seen by audiences in St Andrews, but Bottleneck has already been at Discover 21 in Edinburgh and is heading to the Etcetera Theatre in London. Following the performance in London, there are plans in the pipeline to continue showing it to new audiences across the country.

Bottleneck is in School VI on the 15^th and 16^th April. Tickets on the door for a suggested donation of £4 before touring to the Etcetera Theatre, London on the 21^st April.