The National Theatre of Scotland

Abstract This chapter looks closely at the work staged by the National Theatre of Scotland (NTS), its nature and influence on the wider scene in Scotland since its inaugural production, Home, in 2006. In particular, it will look at how the NTS’s model of a ‘theatre without walls’ allowed its founding artistic director, Vicky Featherstone, and her team to break down barriers, widening access to audiences. The chapter argues that the work of the company is inextricably linked with the country’s politics post-devolution, and that, thanks to the ‘theatre without walls’ model, the company has been able to respond to political events with speed and rigour. Although Featherstone said the establishment of the NTS was not ‘a jingoistic, patriotic stab at defining a nation’s identity through theatre’, questions of Scottish national identity increasingly informed the company’s work in the run-up to the 2014 referendum on Scottish independence. It focuses particularly on early successes such as Black Watch (2006), as well as signature work such as David Greig’s The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart (2011), which drew on the spirit of Scottish popular theatre of the 1970s, notably 7:84’s The Cheviot, the Stag and the Black, Black Oil. The chapter goes on to explore plays and one-off shows staged or viewed through the prism of the 2014 referendum, before touching on how the Scotland of the post-referendum/post-COVID era fits in with the work of the NTS under the current artistic directorship of Jackie Wylie.