1984 🧠

#PRInvite #Gifted | George Orwell's psychological thriller, '1984', takes to the stage in a new adaptation exclusively for Scottish audiences.

Star rating: ★★★★

The fact is that ‘1984’, a new adaptation by Chris Hannan, arrives to police the thoughts of Aberdeen theatregoers at His Majesty’s Theatre this week. The play, co-produced by Citizens Theatre, Dundee Rep, and the Royal Lyceum Edinburgh, is based on George Orwell’s novel ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’, giving it a distinct Scottish identity across the 2 + 2 = 4 stops of its tour.

Originally penned in 1949, Orwell’s novel has long been described as “frightening” and “depressing”, yet so many can’t bear to put the book down. It’s a fusion of power, politics, and propaganda; a dystopian imagination of a nation characterised by a single school of thought. At its core, the premise is simple. What would life be like if everyone felt the same? What would happen if the distinction between insanity and reality was blurred? What could happen if someone was caught disobeying the rigid governing system designed to watch your every move?

It might seem simple, but it's the reactions and afterthoughts to ‘1984’ that are deeply complex. Unpacking this multi-dimensional cautionary tale unironically generates thousands of different ways of thinking about the consequences of censorship. At first, you think about it in the context of the play: how it affects the characters and the narrative you’re watching. Then, you draw connections between the fiction on stage and real-life political landscapes foreign to you, but which becomes troubling. But when you start to question how the play relates to the life you live, well, that’s when it becomes truly unnerving.

Also fueling that sense of familiarity are the names of TV shows we watch today. Orwell’s ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’ coined the terms ‘Big Brother’ and ‘Room 101’, inspiring television to take similar stances on psychological social experiments and confronting inner terrors. What began as a bleak warning has been repackaged for prime-time entertainment, demonstrating how deeply Orwell’s imagination is embedded in our own culture, too.

Yet, what audiences saw last night was far from entertaining in the way tuning into Channel 4 is. ‘1984’ is harrowing, provocative, and lingering - one of those pieces of theatre that stays with you long after the curtain falls, demanding time and space before you can even begin to explain how you really feel.

If the facts say otherwise, the facts must be altered: Chris Hannan adapts the play. Hannan recognises that the conception of ‘1984’ was deeply personal for Orwell following his experiences in the Spanish Civil War. He captures the “organised lying, the creation and faking of truth, the threat of personal liquidation and the annihilation of history and objective truth” Orwell learned firsthand. So, he weaves Orwell into the narrative fabric by rendering him as a character on stage. Used as a striking framing device, Hannan presents Orwell battling tuberculosis during the drafting stages of the novel. He draws direct parallels between the policing of thought in the story and the confinement of Orwell’s real life, referring to his type-writer being confiscated due to his upright posture affecting his illness. Hannan is constantly planting seeds that force you to consider why the book was written in the first place.

Hannan also repositions the piece with a distinct Scottish voice, reflecting the powerful joint venture between three of Scotland’s major theatre companies. Aberdonian audiences are being treated to a unique production shared by only a handful of cities.

Dominic Hill shapes Hannan’s script into an intense, physical, and psychologically thrilling theatrical experience. Leaning heavily into surrealist staging while maintaining razor-sharp focus, Hill directs a strong ensemble cast to bring the claustrophobia of Oceania to life.

Though Aberdeen Performing Arts were not involved in the original creation of the show, it felt as though the production was custom-built for His Majesty’s Theatre. The set is cleverly scaffolded with a caged balcony bordering the stage, offering perhaps the most exposed look at the venue I have ever seen. The creative team purposely reveals the backstage machinery normally hidden from view, allowing the audience to bask in the sheer size of the stage by the final curtain. It’s unabashedly raw - an unfiltered look far removed from the polished, heavily edited world of television shows like Big Brother and Room 101, where production elements are neatly swept out of sight.

Tom Piper designs the show down to the finest detail. The use of split-level caging and mirrors is consistently engaging, but most effective are two dollhouse-like sets that visually reinforce the theme of manipulative control. The truck with the outdoors is particularly impactful, providing a fleeting burst of color that reminds the audience how artificial the characters' brief glimpses of freedom really are. These visual elements are seamlessly tied together by Lizzie Powell’s stark, atmospheric lighting design.

Working in tandem to complement the set and lighting while metaphorically brainwashing the audience is Heather Scott’s video design. The jarring juxtaposition of words and slogans flashing across the backdrop makes the psychological pressure inescapable.

The cast operates through seamless multi-rolling. Though it is handled with absolute fluency, it isn't until the final bow that you fully appreciate how remarkably few actors are required to bring this production to the stage.

The company is led by Jack Tarlton as Orwell, Winston, and ensemble, delivering an effortlessly chilling performance. He is joined by Jessica Hardwick as Julia, alongside a versatile ensemble.

A masterstroke of the production is casting Irene MacDougall as O’Brien. Swapping the traditional patriarchal authority for a female antagonist cleverly upends the classic father-figure tormentor trope. The brutality of the second half feels less like conventional villain and more like a cold, calculating reimagining.

The cast is rounded out by Irene Allan, Neshla Caplan, Peter Collins, Robert Jack, and Zrey Sholapurkar.

Though there is a lot to unpack regarding ‘1984’ and thought-policing, audiences will likely leave sharing a singular, haunting realisation: we should be deeply afraid that the imagination of an author in 1949 continues to materialize around us. 

If we feel frightened watching it unfold on stage, perhaps we have grown too desensitised to our world right now. The rapid rise of artificial intelligence, deepfakes, fake news, and misinformation proves that 2026 isn't nearly as far from 1984 as we might like to think. 

Authoritarianism, corruption, war, and the manipulation of truth mirror the world we live in today - and sometimes it takes a story like this being performed right in our faces before we finally take notice. 

Credits

Instagram links: @theatregramuk, @aberdeenperformingarts

Review by Joel Simpson cc: theatregram@gmail.com

Production photos supplied by Aberdeen Performing Arts