FringeReview Scotland 2025
Piece of Work
James Rowland
Genre: Biographical Drama, Drama, Storytelling
Venue: Traverse Theatre
Festival: FringeReview Scotland
Low Down
James Rowland’s intensely personal ‘Songs of the Heart’ Trilogy has reached its second act with ‘Piece of Work’ about the ‘middle of life’. An exploration of the trials and travails of life, about what makes us question whether we can go on and what convinces us we must go on, ‘Piece of Work’ is a deceptively simple and beautifully performed piece of work.
Review
“To be, or not to be: that is the question”. James Rowland puts this existential predicament front and centre of his show, ‘Piece of Work’. One of the most familiar and possibly hackneyed quotes in the English language is given fresh urgency in the middle play of Rowland’s trilogy which deals with suicidal ideation and the vastness of life’s content. Piece of Work is liberally scattered with quotes from Hamlet, deftly delivered and dissected by Rowlands to illuminate the complexity of his own family background.
As the audience enters the theatre, Rowlands is already on stage, with a chair and table piled with books and notes, shambling round and discoursing amiably with the audience. ‘This isn’t the show”, he tells us, raising the question of what is show and what is reality. In a gentle shaft at trigger warnings, he lets us know that the show deals with issues of suicidal ideation and that audience members can leave at any time they want, as indeed they should feel able to in any show, given that drama essentially deals with life’s difficult questions. Finishing his prologue, Rowlands changes into black and white check pyjamas and holds aloft a thistle seed which he releases to float gently down to the floor to start the show.
Ever the consummate storyteller, Rowlands brings his intimate mixture of storytelling, drama and stand up comedy to bear on the middle part of life. Gradually he unfolds a tale of families, of siblings, two sons, two fathers – his family, his father, his brother. He acquired his adoptive brother, Chris, at the age of 10 and it is clear was, and is, delighted to have him. The two boys’ fathers were friends and Chris became part of James’ family with his own father a significant absent presence. Chris suffers from depression and sometime suicidal ideation; James’ love and concern for his brother is palpable.
But none of our stories are linear; we all contain multitudes. The vastness of our experiences are more than the simple outlines of our stories. When Rowlands asks the audience to take a minute’s silence and consider their life, all of it, the absolutely silent room feels full with reflection.
As Rowlands recounts his stories – he lays out maps on the stage: maps of where they lived, where they moved to, holidayed etc, including a home made one mapping out the spots round about home that were significant in their lives. There are marked paths and ‘desire paths’ he tells us. Sometimes the official route finders don’t provide us with the best guide to life, with the guides we construct for ourselves proving the more trustworthy.
Jonny Humphrey’s direction is sensitive and unobtrusive, maintaining the show’s focus and balance between interiority and interaction.
Trust is an essential component of Rowland’s act, and from the show’s intimate preamble through its carefully constructed words and spaces, Piece of Work establishes a bond between audience and performer as tangible and as delicate as that thistle seed floating though space. What an incredible piece of work.
