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| David MacLennan, who has died aged 65 after suffering from motor neurone disease, was at the heart of Scottish theatre for over 40 years, as an actor, writer and producer. In 1971 he co-founded the influential 7:84 touring company, with his sister, the actor Elizabeth MacLennan, and her husband, the playwright and director John McGrath. | |
| McGrath, who died in 2002, was sympathetic to Scottish independence, though an early 7:84 play, The Game's a Bogey (1974), about the radical politician John MacLean, advocated international socialism with a sly dig at the parochialism in the resurgent Scottish National party. MacLennan had recently come out for the no campaign in the Scottish referendum. He believed in international collaboration and solidarity: "The more borders we can get rid of, the more peaceful the world will be." | McGrath, who died in 2002, was sympathetic to Scottish independence, though an early 7:84 play, The Game's a Bogey (1974), about the radical politician John MacLean, advocated international socialism with a sly dig at the parochialism in the resurgent Scottish National party. MacLennan had recently come out for the no campaign in the Scottish referendum. He believed in international collaboration and solidarity: "The more borders we can get rid of, the more peaceful the world will be." |
| This belief underpinned all his work. For the past 10 years he had run A Play, a Pie and a Pint, an amazingly successful lunchtime theatre project in the west end of Glasgow that operated as both an unofficial wing of the National Theatre of Scotland (formed in 2006) and a platform for international playwrights. | This belief underpinned all his work. For the past 10 years he had run A Play, a Pie and a Pint, an amazingly successful lunchtime theatre project in the west end of Glasgow that operated as both an unofficial wing of the National Theatre of Scotland (formed in 2006) and a platform for international playwrights. |
| Crucially, though, just as 7:84 had its greatest popular success with McGrath's landmark ceilidh show about the Highland clearances, The Cheviot, the Stag, and the Black, Black Oil (1973), which on tour attracted and embraced the grassroots audience whose lives were the subject of the play, so A Play, a Pie and a Pint brings in two or three hundred Glasgow locals every lunchtime, a mixture of students, flexi-workers and the retired. The formula has been franchised to Philadelphia, with Caracas and São Paulo to come. | Crucially, though, just as 7:84 had its greatest popular success with McGrath's landmark ceilidh show about the Highland clearances, The Cheviot, the Stag, and the Black, Black Oil (1973), which on tour attracted and embraced the grassroots audience whose lives were the subject of the play, so A Play, a Pie and a Pint brings in two or three hundred Glasgow locals every lunchtime, a mixture of students, flexi-workers and the retired. The formula has been franchised to Philadelphia, with Caracas and São Paulo to come. |
| This success echoes the lunchtime theatre scene in London, and indeed the Pool theatre in Edinburgh, in the 1970s, but is on a different scale. A Play, a Pie and a Pint takes place in the crypt of a disused church, Òran Mór, converted by businessman Colin Beattie into an arts and restaurant venue, with MacLennan casually suggesting the lunchtime idea. Over 10 years, many important Scottish actors, directors and playwrights, including Robbie Coltrane, Bill Paterson, Elaine C Smith, Liz Lochhead, David Greig and David Hayman have joined in, and there is no sign of a let-up. | This success echoes the lunchtime theatre scene in London, and indeed the Pool theatre in Edinburgh, in the 1970s, but is on a different scale. A Play, a Pie and a Pint takes place in the crypt of a disused church, Òran Mór, converted by businessman Colin Beattie into an arts and restaurant venue, with MacLennan casually suggesting the lunchtime idea. Over 10 years, many important Scottish actors, directors and playwrights, including Robbie Coltrane, Bill Paterson, Elaine C Smith, Liz Lochhead, David Greig and David Hayman have joined in, and there is no sign of a let-up. |
| MacLennan was the youngest of the four children of Sir Hector MacLennan, a gynaecologist and obstetrician, and his wife, Isobel (nee Adam), also a doctor and a noted activist in public health. His grandfather, RJ MacLennan, was the editor of the Glasgow Evening News. David was taken to see Peter Pan at the King's theatre in Glasgow when he was five, and his enthusiasm for popular theatre was further fanned by the Five Past Eight variety shows at the city's Alhambra, which were produced by the renowned entertainer and pantomime dame Jimmy Logan, who happened to be a neighbour. | MacLennan was the youngest of the four children of Sir Hector MacLennan, a gynaecologist and obstetrician, and his wife, Isobel (nee Adam), also a doctor and a noted activist in public health. His grandfather, RJ MacLennan, was the editor of the Glasgow Evening News. David was taken to see Peter Pan at the King's theatre in Glasgow when he was five, and his enthusiasm for popular theatre was further fanned by the Five Past Eight variety shows at the city's Alhambra, which were produced by the renowned entertainer and pantomime dame Jimmy Logan, who happened to be a neighbour. |
| MacLennan was educated at prep school in Drumtochty and at Fettes college in Edinburgh, where he acted in school productions. He went on to Edinburgh University, but did not complete his degree, opting to work as a street refuse collector, and then as a stage manager at the Gardner Centre in Brighton. | MacLennan was educated at prep school in Drumtochty and at Fettes college in Edinburgh, where he acted in school productions. He went on to Edinburgh University, but did not complete his degree, opting to work as a street refuse collector, and then as a stage manager at the Gardner Centre in Brighton. |
| Joining McGrath on 7:84 changed his life. For 25 years – latterly with Wildcat, a rock radical company that added music into the mix, founded with the actor/musician Dave Anderson – he travelled the country, organising tours, building sets, driving lorries, working in communities, writing and acting – until, in a change in the funding climate, the Scottish Arts Council delivered summary execution by withdrawing the grant in 1997. | Joining McGrath on 7:84 changed his life. For 25 years – latterly with Wildcat, a rock radical company that added music into the mix, founded with the actor/musician Dave Anderson – he travelled the country, organising tours, building sets, driving lorries, working in communities, writing and acting – until, in a change in the funding climate, the Scottish Arts Council delivered summary execution by withdrawing the grant in 1997. |
| Whether this was in response to a perceived decline in quality, a politically motivated clampdown, or a desire to inaugurate change for the sake of it, was never clear. MacLennan and Anderson had been producing two or three rock operas a year, covering such unsurprising topics as the dangers of the nuclear threat, the miners' strike, loan sharks in Clydebank, and US foreign policy in Latin America. | |
| The original 7:84 produced plays by McGrath, Trevor Griffiths, John Arden and Margaretta D'Arcy, and continued touring the UK while McGrath and the MacLennans set up 7:84 Scotland. Notable titles included Little Red Hen, The Ballygombeen Bequest and Vandaleur's Folly, all highly charged socialist political vaudevilles, clearly indebted to the example of Joan Littlewood in Oh What a Lovely War, a show MacLennan had seen in 1964 in its original production. | The original 7:84 produced plays by McGrath, Trevor Griffiths, John Arden and Margaretta D'Arcy, and continued touring the UK while McGrath and the MacLennans set up 7:84 Scotland. Notable titles included Little Red Hen, The Ballygombeen Bequest and Vandaleur's Folly, all highly charged socialist political vaudevilles, clearly indebted to the example of Joan Littlewood in Oh What a Lovely War, a show MacLennan had seen in 1964 in its original production. |
| This body of work transformed the Scottish theatre and it was the smartest of moves, when the National Theatre of Scotland was finally formed in 2006, to include all the energies, targets and creative personnel of the various touring companies and smaller theatres into one operation, but not tied to a single building. | This body of work transformed the Scottish theatre and it was the smartest of moves, when the National Theatre of Scotland was finally formed in 2006, to include all the energies, targets and creative personnel of the various touring companies and smaller theatres into one operation, but not tied to a single building. |
| The advent of A Play, a Pie and a Pint could not have been better timed – MacLennan had spent a few interim years working as a freelance – and its plays have spread far beyond the Glasgow crypt. The lunchtime Christmas panto was so successful the company inaugurated a summer one, too, claiming a spurious precedent for such cultural barbarism in the forgotten history of theatre along the Ayrshire coast. | The advent of A Play, a Pie and a Pint could not have been better timed – MacLennan had spent a few interim years working as a freelance – and its plays have spread far beyond the Glasgow crypt. The lunchtime Christmas panto was so successful the company inaugurated a summer one, too, claiming a spurious precedent for such cultural barbarism in the forgotten history of theatre along the Ayrshire coast. |
| One of MacLennan's last projects was curating, for the NTS, with Greig, The Great Yes, No, Don't Know Five Minute Theatre Show for the referendum on Scottish independence. A television documentary about Òran Mór, narrated by the actor Peter Mullan, was broadcast on BBC Scotland on the day MacLennan died. | One of MacLennan's last projects was curating, for the NTS, with Greig, The Great Yes, No, Don't Know Five Minute Theatre Show for the referendum on Scottish independence. A television documentary about Òran Mór, narrated by the actor Peter Mullan, was broadcast on BBC Scotland on the day MacLennan died. |
| He is survived by his second wife, the actor Juliet Cadzow, whom he married in 1988, and their son, Shane, as well as Elizabeth, and his brothers, Robert, the former leader of the SDP and now the Liberal Democrats' cabinet spokesman in the House of Lords, and Keith, a banker. | He is survived by his second wife, the actor Juliet Cadzow, whom he married in 1988, and their son, Shane, as well as Elizabeth, and his brothers, Robert, the former leader of the SDP and now the Liberal Democrats' cabinet spokesman in the House of Lords, and Keith, a banker. |
| • David MacLennan, actor, writer and producer, born 19 June 1948; died 13 June 2014 | • David MacLennan, actor, writer and producer, born 19 June 1948; died 13 June 2014 |