REVIEW: A Toast Fae the Lassies (Pitlochry Festival Theatre)

A Toast Fae the Lassies – ★★★★☆ – Enchanting

Pitlochry Festival Theatre
29 & 30 Aug; 4, 10, 18, 24 Sept 
Review by Rebecca Mahar
 
Pitlochry Festival Theatre premieres the enchanting new musical play A Toast Fae the Lassies in a limited six-show run this autumn, bringing the ghosts of Robert Burns and the women who knew him best to the intimate Studio theatre.
 
On the 25^th of January 1797, Agnes Broun (Alyson Orr) visits St. Michael’s Churchyard in Dumfries to remember her recently deceased son, Robert Burns, on his birthday. There she is joined by Burns’s widow, Jean Amour (Stephanie Cremona), and shortly thereafter by one of his many mistresses, his muse Clarinda (Eden Barrie). Together the women remember their Rabbie, warts and all, through their words and his own.

Stephanie Cremona, Alyson Orr, and Eden Barrie in A Toast Fae the Lassies. Pic: Tommy Ga-Ken Wan.

Written and directed by John Binnie, with musical direction, arrangements, and additional composition by Orr, A Toast Fae the Lassies is a tongue in cheek devotional to the national poet. It neither vilifies nor overly worships him, working to bring him to life as he might have been remembered by these three vital women who survived him. 
 
Orr, Cremona, and Barrie deliver beautifully rich portrayals, heightened by gorgeously sung music. Each has a distinctive sound, full of character, and when they come together their voices blend into lush harmonies that fill the Studio with echoes of the inspirations behind Burns’s words. 
 
Each woman is given space to tell her story, and point out where the romanticisation of Burns may fall short of reality, despite her own weakness for his charms. Even Broun is not overcome by a mother’s rose-tinted glasses: “I’m his mammy,” she says, “he telt me everything. And if he missed bits out, I got ‘em from his poyums.”

Eden Barrie and Chris Coxon in A Toast Fae the Lassies. Pic: Tommy Ga-Ken Wan.

 
Although Burns’s words are, of course, a centrepiece of A Toast Fae the Lassies, he himself has no voice: Burns is represented by Chris Coxon, who is credited only as Musician, but is clearly meant to be Rabbie’s shade. Watching the women from beyond the veil, Coxon plays guitar to underscore and accompany, but never speaks, Burns only looking and listening with haunting expressiveness to how he is remembered, and never quite able to touch.
 
Set and costume design from Natalie Fern create the world of the graveyard and its inhabitants, texture and detail prevalent in both. Fern’s costumes are particularly noteworthy, defining the ages and social statuses of the three women with specificity and beauty. Adam Bowers’s lighting design adds the final layers of depth and delight to the production, from the gloaming of the churchyard to the bright sparkle of memory.

Chris Coxon, Eden Barrie, and Alyson Orr in A Toast Fae the Lassies. Pic: Tommy Ga-Ken Wan.

A Toast Fae the Lassies may be the story of the first Burns Night, centred around the man in the ground, but its heart is the lassies themselves; the women who outlived Burns, emerging from his long shadow to claim their places in his legend. They are in the words, they are the words, and scunner or no, “he wouldnae be anything without his lassies.” This new production is heartwarming, haunting, blunt and beautiful, and sure to please.
 
Running time: One hour with no interval
Venue: Pitlochry Festival Theatre (Studio), Port-na-Craig, Pitlochry PH16 5DR
29 & 30 Aug; 4, 10, 18, 24 Sept 2025
Time: 8:00pm (29 & 30 Aug; 10 & 24 Sept), 2:30pm (4 & 18 Sept)
Tickets: https://www.pitlochryfestivaltheatre.com/whats-on/a-toast-fae-the-lassies/