New play raises up the voices of Aberdeen residents

A Play for Torry is a bold, community-led theatre event. It’s the co-creation of residents, artists and campaigners in Torry, Aberdeen. It’ll preview at Aberdeen Arts Centre on 31 January and then premiere at Nigg Bay Golf Club in Torry on 1 February.

Funny, moving and defiant, A Play for Torry fuses verbatim storytelling with original music by Simon Gall and Coralie Usmani. It creates a rich, multi-sensory night out. One that’s part ceilidh, part protest, and part love-letter to a community that refuses to be quiet.

Under the direction of Emer Morris and Annabel Lunney, the play builds from real voices and lived experiences of people who have suffered from the rise and decline of industry, while fighting for land, health and home.

From fish to oil to wind

Torry has been consistently wracked by industrial land grabs over the years. On the edge of Aberdeen, Europe’s ‘Oil Capital’, the community was cleared from Old Torry to make way for the fishing and oil industries.

Torry’s Bay of Nigg is now a concrete industrial harbour. The city’s landfill and waste incinerator surrounds St Fittick’s Park, the biodiverse regenerated wetland and Torry’s only green space.

And today, Ian Wood – the father of North Sea Oil – wants to bulldoze the park to make way for an ‘Energy Transition Zone’.

A Play for Torry asks urgent questions: who is the “Just Transition” really for? What does it cost when decision making about climate and land doesn’t include the people who live there?

Authorities punch down, this play raises the community up

Rooted in Torry, the show resonates far beyond Aberdeen, echoing the stories of coastal and industrial communities across Scotland. With live music, ensemble performance and special appearances from local guest artists, A Play for Torry invites audiences to celebrate, reflect, and to ask together: how do we want to do things?

Nathaniel Campbell-Scott-Howells, Torry resident and Friends of St. Fittick’s Park outdoor classroom coordinator said:

A Play for Torry represents the voices that organisations like Aberdeen City Council and the Energy Transition Zone continue to ignore. While they punch down on Torry residents affected by RAAC, the threats to industrialise St. Fittick’s Park, and numerous socio-economic challenges, the play uplifts them through the use of their actual words, stories and history to make it clear we’re a community and we care more about each other than making some big corporations wealthy.

Emer Morris, writer and director of A Play For Torry said:

This is a co-authored project built to bring out the joy we all need right now and to celebrate the resilience of the people, even when it’s been tough.

People of Torry have been part of this every step of the way, and this is an example of professional artists and community collaborating to a story about experience in North East Scotland.

This story is significant because what happens here – and what has happened – echoes far beyond Torry and Aberdeen: it has real resonance for what unfolds across Scotland and all of these isles.

Sharon Catchpole, interim executive director of Aberdeen Arts Centre, said:

At Aberdeen Arts Centre, we believe theatre should be accessible to everyone – whether they want to sit in the audience, work behind the scenes, or step out on stage.

We have loved working with the team behind A Play for Torry throughout its development, allowing one of Aberdeen’s historic communities to shine a light on the issues that affect them.

Community-driven theatre can be an incredibly powerful medium for communicating complex issues and ideas, and this production is no different – bringing issues that affect Aberdonians to a wider audience.

Co-written by Mae Diansangu, Shane Strachan, Emer Morris, and the local community, A Play for Torry is funny, fierce and full of hope. It’s a celebration of resilience, collective strength and the drive to imagine something better.