Fashioning a Scottish Operative: Black Watch and Banal Theatrical Nationalism on Tour in the US

Abstract

This essay examines the US tours (2007–13) of Black Watch, a docudrama about the eponymous military unit, produced by the National Theatre of Scotland (NTS). I argue that the production manifests a ‘banal theatrical nationalism’ when theatrical national signifiers meet quotidian acts of soldiering and the mundane labour required to remount the production at each tour venue. I focus attention on the regimental history recounted through ‘Fashion’, the play's central military uniform dressing sequence, and introduce into my analysis a New York City fashion show, Dressed to Kilt, to interrogate the stakes of fashion, cultural production and visibility. Black Watch materializes what I am calling a ‘Scottish operative’ that acts on behalf of the NTS in securing international attention and potential investment. In order to query the sociopolitical stakes of this production's US success, I identify political, cultural and military links between the US and Scotland.