National Theatre of Scotland associate director Graham McLaren has curated Blabbermouth, a twelve-hour event for the day before the referendum on Scottish independence.
Running at The Assembly Hall, Edinburgh on 17 September, the programme includes music, song and spoken word, featuring more than 60 invited artists, actors, politicians, journalists, sportspeople, singers and scientists.
The event will be divided into four sessions, each providing an alternative and wide-ranging, mosaic-like presentation of Scotland’s written word legacy with live music performances. The age guide is 14 years plus.
McLaren said of Blabbermouth, “on the eve of the independence referendum, I want to create a moment for us to simply celebrate Scotland and its contribution to the world, in its own words, read by its own people.”
Blabbermouth is part of the National Theatre of Scotland’s Dear Scotland 2014 season of theatre, debate and celebration. Audiences are being invited to complete a postcard with the greeting line "Dear Scotland"; the responses will form a living record of the year.
Also this week is the opening of The Citizens Theatre's headline production, Hamlet.
Directed by artistic director Dominic Hill, the title role is taken by Scottish actor Brian Ferguson with real-life couple Roberta Taylor and Peter Guinness as Gertrude and Claudius.
Looking ahead, a revival of The Slab Boys will open the Citizens Theatre’s 70th anniversary season in 2015.
The Slab Boys is the 1978 semi–autobiographical play by playwright and artist John Byrne. Set in the Paisley carpet factory in 1957, its depiction of working-class youth culture in post-war industrial Scotland has made it a landmark play in Scottish theatre.
The play will be directed by David Hayman, who will also take the role of Mr Currie, and John Byrne will design the production.
John Byrne also features twice over in the autumn-winter season at The Tron Theatre.
He has adapted and designed Anton Chekhov's Three Sisters with a ten-strong cast for the Company's main stage and revisited his tale of two Scottish painters, Colquhoun and Macbryde, one of a number of shows to be staged in association with Glasgay!.
Before that, Alan Bisset and Sacha Kyle present a satire for contemporary Scotland in Referendum Night Special: The Pure, The Dead and The Brilliant.
Included in the new season is Selma Dimitrijevic and Mikhail Durnenkov's all-female version of Gogol's The Gamblers, Glasgay! commission Chekhovian farce Cardinal Sinne and Paul Coulter's Linwood No More about an ex-employee of the Chrysler Car Factory.
The Tron season closes with Christmas shows Miracle on 34 Parnie Street and, for the 3 to 6 age group, The Elf By Herself.