Casting the Runes: see it!

I've been very busy recently with the Crieff Arts Festival, so I am horrified to say that I very nearly missed an experience that no M.R.James fan should forgo: a new adaptation of Casting the Runes!

This production by Box Tale Soup was at the Edinburgh Fringe and nearing the end of its run (eek!) when a Facebook post about it by fellow author Roy Gill caught my eye. I dropped everything and went!

I'm not going to post a full review of the show here because I am going to write one for the M.R.James Ghosts and Scholars Newsletter, which is the go-to place for all things Jamesian. However, speaking as a lifelong fan of M.R.James, I think it is a really excellent production, and if you have a chance to see it, I urge you to go! It is genuinely creepy and I did actually jump in places!

I see from Box Tale Soup's calendar, which you can see by clicking on the linked version of their name above, that they have performances scheduled for October in Cheltenham. I hope very much that there will be others in due course.

In the meantime, the brilliant M.R.James-inspired Podcast to the Curious has a new podcast out, featuring a Jamesian double bill. The second part features an interview with Antonia and Noel from Box Tale Soup, so that is well worth listening to for all the background info about Casting the Runes. 
The first part of the show is all about MRJ's unfinished story The Game of Bear - it analyses the story fragment and examines the various endings created by myself and fellow authors Clive Ward and Jacqueline Simpson. All in all, a Jamesian treat!