Although set in a Dublin pub, the stage version of Once has distinctly Scottish roots.
It was created by John Tiffany at the request of former Bond producer Barbara Broccoli.
“I thought she was mad,” he recalls, “but there was a scene which chimed in the film, of a big Dublin house party, where everyone does their turn and that I thought was the way in, only we used a pub where they swapped Czech and Irish folk songs.”
At the time, he was taking a sabbatical from the National Theatre of Scotland in the US and Black Watch, which he’d directed and co-created, was on tour there.
“My whole apprenticeship for life, work and heart was here in Scotland. Glasgow University, the Traverse Theatre and the National Theatre of Scotland.
“So I made the show out of the person I was then, someone who was passionate about the particular characteristics of Scottish theatre, like music and direct address and a real sense of community.”