Review: Still Game: The Final Farewell – SSE Hydro, Glasgow

First published in The Times, Monday October 7 2019

Two Stars

When the BBC Scotland sitcom Still Game bowed out this year its writers Ford Kiernan and Greg Hemphill left fans in no doubt that this was the end for Jack Jarvis, Victor McDade and the Craiglang posse. Not since the final episode of Blake’s 7, in 1981, has a television series more ruthlessly dispatched most of its starring cast.

Review: Cinderella – SEC Armadillo, Glasgow

First published in The Times, Monday December 17 2018

Three Stars

Manchester’s loss is Glasgow’s gain. Last Christmas, the legendary comedy pairing of Ian and Janette Tough aka the Krankies, along with their performing partner-in-crime John Barrowman, hit the headlines for all the wrong reasons when their innuendo-laden production of Dick Whittington at the Manchester Opera House attracted a barrage of complaints from outraged panto-goers.

Review: Still Game Live 2 – SSE Hydro, Glasgow

First published in The Times, Monday February 6 2017

Three Stars

“We’re gonnae keep it real this time,” says Jack (Ford Kiernan) at the start of this second live outing for the Glasgow sitcom, a nod to the dazzling Bollywood song-and-dance number that brought the curtain (and the house) down at the end of the first incarnation of Still Game Live, back in 2014.

 

Predictably, Jack’s claim of going back to comedy basics is undermined almost immediately when Navid (Sanjeev Kohli) appears, floating on a magic carpet above the counter in Harrid’s convenience store. Isa (Jane McCarry) makes her entrance, with sparks shooting out of the end of her mop. Winston (Paul Riley) arrives, flying from wires, Peter Pan-style, while Tam (Mark Cox) fires himself out of a cannon. The crowd in the 12,000-seat Hydro goes wild.