Direct line to Burns that bypasses years in between
Karen Dunbar is a member of a tiny elite group in Scottish entertainment; those who have become well-known television faces, while also sustaining stage careers that span the whole range of live performance, from stand-up comedy, pantomime and musicals, to the most powerful classic theatre.
Born in Ayr in 1971, Dunbar moved to Glasgow in the late 1980s, after school at Ayr Academy.shebeganhershowbiz career as a DJ and karaoke host; but in 1997, she was cast in Bbcscotland’stelevisionsketch show Chewin’ The Fat, moving on in 2003 to her own Karen Dunbar Show. In 2007, she made her first appearance in the King’s Theatre pantomime inglasgowandin2008,atoran Mor in Glasgow, she effectively launched her theatre career with a thrilling Play, Pie And Pint performance in A Drunk Woman Looks At The Thistle.
Over the past decade, Dunbar’s acting career has flourished, and has taken her from the National Theatre in London to Perth Theatre.
In between, she has tackled challenges including the role of sexually abused wife Rose Ouimet in Michel Tremblay’s The Guid Sisters, and the uniquely demanding role of Winnie in Samuel Beckett’s Happy Days And all of this, while also continuing to wow comedy festival audiences with her own stand-up show, pursuing a career as a radio and television presenter, picking up a Role Model of the Year award as an icon for Scotland’s LGBT community, and co-presenting the 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games opening ceremony.
In this recording, though, Dunbar returns to her Ayrshire roots, as in classically unadorned Dunbar style – woolly hat, no make-up – she delivers an extract from Robert Burns’s Tam O’shanter, a poem which she has famously performed all over Scotland. What’s striking about Dunbar’s performance – in an age when Burns is sometimes dismissed as incomprehensible – is just how comfortably she absorbs his language into her own contemporary performing voice, tracing a direct line of descent from the Ayrshire Scots of the 1790s, to the rhythms of west of Scotland comic patter in the 21st century.
And just as Dunbar profoundly understands the humour of Burns’s famous story, so she also seems to embody the robust attachment to reality, and to common sense, that shapes this comic classic of the Enlightenment. Frighten yourself with old stories of the supernatural if you like, says Burns, but don’t get carried away, or it will be the worse for you; and Karen Dunbar seems, in this wonderful performance, to agree.
Karen Dunbar has launched a new online venture in partnership with the Citizens’ Theatre called Karen Dunbar’s Spoken Word Club, introducing community groups to the joys of rap, grime, beat poetry and more. The sessions cover lyric writing, beat making and performance techniques, and will culminate in a celebratory showcase event featuring special guest artists. For more information visit https:// www.citz.co.uk/whatson