FringeReview Scotland 2025
Halifax 1749 2014
Lillian Ross Millard presented as part of Buzzcut Double Thrills
Genre: Drama, Experimental, Fringe Theatre, Solo Show
Venue: Centre for Contemporary Arts
Festival: FringeReview Scotland
Low Down
Focused upon Millard’s own journey from downtown Toronto, through childhood into university, ending up in Glasgow for six years and six months, this is a personal, story-driven performance. At times it entices us into their world but doesn’t always deliver the punch or solve the puzzle. Technically it is a fairly static performance piece.
Review
Lillian Ross-Millard takes us through her childhood in Toronto, where falling seems to have been an option, through university in Halifax, where she has to sell apples to pay for her studies, before she leaps the pond and arrives in the UK. Millard takes us along these meanderings with some intriguing episodes which are accompanied by a discordant noise throughout. The narrative is interesting, but delivered in non-dramatic fashion, allowing us, to an extent, to concentrate on the words. Her development as she grew up and the growth of this authentic story gets better as it goes along, despite the white noise that accompanies it.
Theatrically it could do with more variance in tone and pace which would allow us to engage more fully with the drama or the lack of drama involved. Ross Millard is a relatively engaging presence on stage and dressed as she was in an all-in-one costume. It was backdrop support rather than focussed on the storyline and seemed to support a neutral stance rather than have any meaning.
Technically the highlights seemed to be two delicately placed maple syrup bottles that kept a discordant note throughout – Millard is at least Canadian. Those discordant notes “played” on the Yamaha organ left me with the beginnings of a headache and detracted from the narrative.
Staging had two elements: the Yamaha organ with the aforementioned two bottles of maple syrup and a lit area with the microphone where Ross Millard delivered her monologue. As a piece of theatricality this did not allow a lot of depth.
Whilst Halifax 1749 2014 is pushing boundaries in terms of structurally performed narratives, it was not radical enough. I wanted to feel I was being taken on a journey of authentic newness. It didn’t feel quite as original and authentic and out there as I wanted it to.
There were elements of Millard’s story that I particularly enjoyed and once she got to Halifax and was at school there was a greater fluidity to the whole story. However, the discordant noise left me with nothing but a form of tinnitus and an increasingly sore head. Having that as a background and making us feel slightly uncomfortable was a clever attempt to match what was the story, however, I could have done with less of the noise and more of the depth of emotion that I think was missing from this delivery.
At times Halifax 1749 2014 hinted at more drama, and I would be delighted to have the opportunity to see where this might go to but I think that in terms of theatricality one person coming and spending six years and six months in Glasgow should be accompanied by the drama of how it is that they got here rather than unpleasant noise – perhaps more fanfare.
