BLACK WATCH

Gregory Burke's 'Black watch'

Introduction

Black watch, a popular play, composed by Gregory Burke and directed by John Tiffany for the National Theatre of Scotland. The play is based on the input from former soldiers through interviews and portrays soldiers serving on the operation TELIC in the Black Watch regiment of British Army during 2004 in Iraq. It was witnessed before the amalgamation into the Royal Regiment of Scotland and was first performed on August 1st, 2006 during the Edinburgh Festival in a temporary Transverse state at the former University of Edinburgh officers Training Corporation Drill hall.

Black Watch is a tale of Iraq but also of Fife and, as usual today, Burke is full of Fife yarns. His dad Brian's first name is Joseph, but the priest refused to acknowledge it because it wasn't Catholic enough. "And his mother wouldn't let him be evacuated from Rosyth in case he ended up at a Protestant school. He was the last boy left in the town and had to take his chances with the Luftwaffe until he was eight."

Discussion

A cult has built up around Burke's award-winning play. Those who saw it feel privileged to have been there. In Fife, it's already the stuff of myth. "One of the wardrobe assistants was on a bus the other day and she got chatted up by this lad who spotted her Black Watch bag," explains Burke. "He said he was in the regiment (Robertson 2008, 2). He said the play was his story. Complete bollocks!" Burke did enlist the help of young soldiers who had returned home to Fife from Iraq and then wrote the interview process into the drama. To help them adjust to Civvy Street, he kept their identities secret. But they loved Black Watch and have kept in touch with the playwright. "One of them phoned me the other day when he read a story about how the play being turned into a movie would make me a millionaire.'You kept that quiet,' he said. 'Where's my cut?' A cult has built up around Burke's award-winning play. Those who saw it feel privileged to have been there. In Fife, it's already the stuff of myth. "One of the wardrobe assistants was on a bus the other day and she got chatted up by this lad who spotted her Black Watch bag," explains Burke. "He said he was in the regiment. He said the play was his story. Complete bollocks!" Whatever else we think of him, Sir Sean Connery has a knack for pronouncement that our political leaders possibly lack. So when the night of the cinema screen commanded us to go to see Black Watch and take our children too - because they would most definitely learn something about Scotland and its history - we listened (Robertson 2008, 2).

Fast-forward six months and 23 sold-out performances at the Edinburgh Festival, and Gregory Burke is sipping coke in a pub in Glasgow's West End during a break in rehearsals for the eagerly awaited tour ...