FringeReview Scotland 2026
The Gospel According to Jesus, Queen of Heaven
Royal Conservatoire of Scotland Emergence Festival 2026
Genre: LGBT, LGBTQIA+, Theatre
Venue: The Centre for Contemporary Arts Glasgow
Festival: FringeReview Scotland
Low Down
Reimagining Jesus as a transgender woman is less of a bold step now than it was at the time that Jo Clifford wrote it, however … Given the number of attacks that have increased against transgender people it has returned to being a topic worthy of all of us paying attention. Here, the risk is reduced due to the skill Clifford has in taking the scriptures, make them relevant to today and importantly to the context of being Trans now, with a text both vibrant and prescient.
Review
The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland’s Emergence Festival provides a platform for senior students to present their work to an audience as part of their final preparations for joining the profession. They are designed to challenge us and the students onstage.
Taking such a classic text for the festival is a risk in itself, but here we have a strong performance delivering not just the context in which the text sits but also a contemporary feel, notwithstanding an accent that delivers poignancy given that stateside they have voted in one of the greatest opponents to transgenderism. It is nice to hear that democracy still thrives.
The script runs through familiar and well-known parables and stories, including the Marriage Feast of Cana, which Jesus tells in the gospels and manages to connect transgenderism in ways that are both subtle and compelling.
If the script provides a secure platform, it needs a comfortable delivery, and Brandon DAWSON is compelling. Upon arrival we are greeted with all the enthusiasm you would expect of an American in Scotland as we are ushered to feel welcome and comfortable.
That comfort is important. These texts are sacred to many and it ill beholds us to deny that. Cliford’s skill and that to which DAWSON is equal is to make them feel both new and believable.
The only time I have ever seen this was delivered by Clifford herself at St Mark’s Church in Edinburgh. I was not quite as taken by the text nor the performances as others have been but still marvelled that it was a radical interpretation of a very conservative text, delivered in the surroundings of a church. Here we are in a small room that could simply be an office. Ironically it adds to the feel of the piece as these stories would have first of all been shared in houses and amongst communities brought together to worship wherever they could. Here we get the performance in a makeshift theatre gathering us together wherever we can manage to be present.
Here in a room with little by way of theatrical artifice, we have to engage with our performer and hear those stories as stories to be heard and accepted. At times, Brandi=on did display a level of nervousness which, along with occasional asides detracted slightly form he delivery of the work and I would have liked some more theatricality, some variation in tone and pace to drive lessons to be learn and the voices of the unheard to be heeded.
Ably supported by three stage management helpers, one manning the lights and giving us all a little cup at the beginning, the other two providing musical accompaniments which were basic – at least one of them could have looked a little more interested in it all, behaving like the younger brother roped in to wear a boiler suit and hit glasses filled with water because mummy and daddy told him he had to.
Perhaps the greatest compliment I can give is that I could reasonably and favourably compare this with Clifford’s own performance. It was in safe hands but also was in a safe space. Long may both expand to cover the rest of the universe.
