Review: Outside Eyes at the Tron
Reflecting on four compelling new works-in-progress presented on a main stage, exploring political anxiety, historical echoes, systemic healthcare failures, and the physical weight of grief.
by Mikael Lee Donaldson
Glasgow’s Tron Theatre recently hosted Outside Eyes, offering audiences a rare glimpse into four developing pieces of new writing. Rather than the rough-and-ready basement bars and back rooms typically associated with scratch nights, seeing these pieces presented on a main stage with a traditional theatre audience offered a fascinating look at the evolution of new writing.
Here is a look at the four performances shared on the night.
Performance 1: Here Today… by Harshad Keval
Here Today… presents a chillingly plausible near-future where all asylum seekers, refugees, and immigrants have been removed from the UK. The story unfolds entirely through a phone conversation with Julie, a 54-year-old white corner shop owner in England with a working-class Yorkshire accent. She speaks with a journalist on the phone about the new reality of a Britain that has embraced the "Return Party" led by a Farage-esque figure, Garage.
What makes the piece so effective is how it avoids grand political elitism, focusing instead on everyday people like Julie. She is a pillar of the community who genuinely believes she is protecting the country, yet her reasoning is steeped in casual bigotry and small-mindedness. Keval brilliantly captures the banality of modern far-right rhetoric – the complaints about people walking in groups by the river, the hypocrisy of masking up while protesting hijabs & burkas, and the delusion that getting rid of "foreigners" would somehow fix public infrastructure.
The emotional core hits hardest towards the end during a brief flashback, when a young man with brown skin whom Julie has known his whole life comes to the shop to say goodbye before being deported, despite having a UK passport. It exposes the devastating disconnect between Julie's warm personal relationships and the cold rhetoric she blindly supports. While a stagnant one-actor phone monologue is challenging to sustain, the writing is razor-sharp and holds up a vital, uncomfortable mirror to current political anxieties sweeping across the country.
I would have liked to see Julie combated with her views more now that the "fight" has died down, she exists in her shop with no customers, and Britain is essentially falling apart. Would she listen now? It’s an excellent piece that could go in a number of great directions, perhaps as an episodic piece with different perspectives like the National Theatre's Death of England in 2024.
Performance 2: Home Away, Home Again by Angus Bhattacharya and Neel Debdutt Paul
Shifting fluidly between two timelines – Calcutta in 1958 and present-day 2026 – this two-hander uses the simple framing of old friends cooking dinner together to explore the heavy echoes of history, politics, and displacement. In 1958, Dhruv meets his friend Abir after events in the 1940s led to a sudden separation, while in 2026, Krishno and Arnab reunite in Calcutta after living together in Edinburgh.
The play asks compelling questions about what happens when a political movement or freedom struggle actually succeeds. Once the fight is won, where does the internal violence and passion go? For the 1958 characters, freedom has been won, but the lingering reality of racism remains; the doctor acknowledges that while they may have carved out a life in England, they will always be marked as different. Meanwhile, the 2026 characters grapple with the urge to make meaningful political change through art while weighed down by the responsibilities of modern adulthood, career, and family.
Using lighting changes to signal the rapid shifts between decades, the piece creates a strong sense of the cyclical nature of time. While the constant jumping between eras occasionally feels like playing catch-up for the audience, the atmosphere, strong performances, and rich thematic questions about home and identity linger long after the lights go down.
Performance 3: Crossmatch by Valerie Andrews
Crossmatch tackles a deeply harrowing systemic issue through a remarkably grounded family dynamic. When their father falls critically ill in Guatemala, three estranged siblings are forced back together in a hospital waiting room. Before their father can receive surgery, all three must donate blood – confronting the dark, highly capitalised reality of a Guatemalan healthcare system where patients are forced to buy back their own donated blood from private corporations.
The sibling rivalry and sharp banter immediately ground the narrative, preventing the script from feeling like a dry political lecture. Andrews balances dark humour with urgent social critique, highlighting the fragility of public healthcare. It naturally prompts audiences in the UK to reflect on the immense privilege of the NHS – and the terrifying implications of privatising health.
While the 15-to-20-minute scratch format leaves you wanting an even deeper dive into the Guatemalan healthcare crisis and the systemic failures behind it, the sheer economy of the writing is a masterclass in world-building. The complex character dynamics and poignant reflections on modern, digital-age slacktivism – sending virtual hearts instead of offering real, tangible support – make this a remarkably rich piece of new writing, showing how a script can have layers and world-building without needing to force exposition.
Performance 4: Tightrope by Raisah Ahmed
Tightrope explores loss, grief, and denial through the vivid physical metaphor of a tightrope walker. Raha struggles to make it from one end of the rope to the other, continually falling off as she attempts to process the trauma of her grandmother’s passing six months prior. The constant falling and getting back up brilliantly mirrors the unpredictable waves of grief, where you feel like you are finally getting back to reality before a sudden memory knocks you right back down.
While the central imagery is striking, the staging – which included a secondary actor playing a doctor standing silently at the back when not speaking – felt somewhat underutilised and pulled focus from Raha's raw, personal journey. The non-linear switches in time occasionally cluttered a narrative that might have packed a heavier emotional punch as a streamlined solo piece. Nevertheless, Ahmed's exploration of how we pretend we are "fine" in the wake of profound loss captures a universal human truth about the difficulty of letting go.
This felt like the beginnings of a really strong idea. Letting Raha tell the story on a rope with real stakes – like preparing for something big – would have worked in the stories favour. I felt the other actor hindered the play; I wasn’t sure if his standing with his back to us was intentional (looking at death, perhaps?), but personally, I think it's a stronger one-person piece.
Closing Thoughts on the Evening
Overall, attending Outside Eyes at the Tron was a powerful reminder of why grassroots and developing new writing matters so much. Scratch nights across the city typically find their home in the basement stages of bars, the back rooms of cafes, and hidden spaces normally dormant – carrying a real rough-and-ready, grassroots vibe which we love. Seeing these works presented on a main stage with a traditional theatre audience elevated the experience beyond a standard scratch, offering a fascinating look at the next step in the evolution of new writing.
It gave artists a chance to test their work not just for feedback in front of peers, but in a real theatre environment with audiences who wouldn't normally attend a scratch. Each piece tackled heavy, urgent themes – from rising nationalism and historical displacement to broken healthcare systems and personal grief – proving that contemporary Scottish new writing is deeply necessary.
