Black Watch, the hit National Theatre of Scotland production, took to the stage in Los Angeles for the first time last night, with the praise of one of America's leading media voices ringing in its ears.
Newsweek, the second-biggest news magazine in the US, behind Time, selling more than three million copies a week, declared Black Watch to be a "landmark night of theatre".
This week the publication dedicates an entire feature to Gregory Burke's play, which was performed last night for the first time outside Scotland at the Freud Theatre in Los Angeles.
Los Angeles itself is a one-newspaper town, where the Los Angeles Times dominates, and its review of Black Watch's first night is to be printed on Friday.
However, the US press is well aware of the play: Variety, the Hollywood magazine treated as a bible in the entertainment industry, previewed the show months ago.
Newsweek's latest edition has called the "dazzlingly choreographed" play "a staggering and devastating tale". It concludes: "Expect to walk out of Black Watch overcome by (the soldiers') grief, their courage and their humanity."
Los Angeles is eight hours behind UK time, so the play was effectively performed last night at three in the morning. The Herald will report the first US reaction to the award-winning play in tomorrow's edition.
David Sefton, the director of the annual UCLA Live festival which has brought the play to the US, says it represents the "absolute pinnacle of politicised theatre right now".
The work, directed by John Tiffany, was premiered at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe last year, and is based on real accounts of soldiers serving in the 300-year old Scottish regiment in Iraq.
It has gone from sold-out tours in Scottish theatres to a BBC television documentary and performance and now is being performed in LA before it moves to New York next month.
The first week of performances in LA are completely sold out.
Mr Sefton, a Brit who ran the popular Flux Music Festival in Edinburgh from 1997 to 1999, admitted he does have one concern over the play: its strong accent and its language.
Tiffany has already slightly altered the actors' delivery of their lines to make the very Scottish - and Fife - dialogue more understandable to the American audience.
Some words (such as "pissed") have also been changed as they have different meanings across the Atlantic.
"I am concerned about it translating to the US stage in a literal sense - I don't know whether the audience will understand what the actors are saying," Mr Sefton said.
"I am a little bit concerned: it's the combination of the accent and the speed at which it is delivered. But I would never dream of changing it or subtitling the play - only in jest.
"I am deeply intrigued to see what the audience makes of it, because it is by no means a completely liberal crowd here.
"The interesting thing is that the left (of politics) in the US is more familiar with the position of being anti-war, but pro-army, than in the UK.
"That's a very common American viewpoint, so the play may resonate even more here than it has back home."
Ali Craig, 25, one of the actors in the play, who plays the role of the soldier Stewarty, says that the whole cast has been working hard on subtle changes to the play for the US stage.
"The US is a completely different culture and we have to be aware of that," he said.
"There's no point bringing the show over if people cannot understand us, or spending the first 10 minutes working out what we are saying on stage.
"It's subtle: the accent is still there, but it's toned down, the articulation of words is more. The (strong) language - that's just how the soldiers speak, it's not deliberately to offend."
Craig said he was intrigued to know how the audience will respond to the play, and added: "What I really hope the audience takes from it is that this is the Black Watch's point of view, not anyone else in Iraq, not America's, but it is the Black Watch's story.
"What people take from that is up to them: but this is a very truthful representation of those soldiers' point of view."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article