What a joy to hear applause again in the Citz. The theatre’s seven-year renovation has been hard. In that time, many have been lost, including the victims of the pandemic and, only last month, the mighty Giles Havergal , the company’s artistic director from 1969 to 2003.
Fitting, then, that the opening production should be a requiem. Less a drama than a mass, it is a eulogy to those killed in the Lockerbie bombing in 1988, the single biggest terrorist loss of life on UK territory. The powerful act one closing song has just three words: “Let us remember.”
The nearest parallel to this sentiment-laden music-theatre piece by Frances Poet and Ricky Ross is Come from Away. Both shows are concerned with how small communities deal with global events. In the musical by Irene Sankoff and David Hein, the locals in a Newfoundland town care for those stranded after 9/11; here, the people of a small Scottish town cope with the grief of the downing of Pan Am flight 103 in the most practical way they can.
The heartening moral of a heavy story is in the small acts of love they show towards the bereaved families, primarily American, who are otherwise unknown to them. They piece together belongings, clean clothes and create memorials. In the face of tragedy, they offer hope.
Poet’s script is strong on detail: the stench of aircraft fuel, the debris causing punctures and the first responder who moves a child’s body for fear it will be eaten by foxes. Uninterested in the reasons for the attack, she presents the personal as political. If Small Acts of Love wallows in sadness, it does so unashamedly.
Carrying much of the emotion are Ross’s songs, sweet celebrations of community, their Americana-tinged folk melodies given gentle force by the large – and excellent – ensemble and delicate arrangements by a chamber orchestra under the musical direction of Gavin Whitworth. In Dominic Hill’s consummate production, Tom Piper’s bare-bones set is dynamically lit by Bruno Poet, and even if you miss the grit of conflict, you would need a hard heart not to be moved by its humanist intent.