Rebus

Heather and I went to Edinburgh this evening to see a play called “A Game called Malice” which is a murder mystery starring Inspector Rebus. It was written by Ian Rankine, who also wrote the very successful Rebus novels. There have also been two television series about the sardonic Rebus solving crimes around the underworld of Edinburgh. It was at the Edinburgh Festival Theatre, so we had a tasty dinner first at Solti’s which is just round the corner. The tickets said that it started at 7 p.m. but it turned out to be 7.30 so we were very early; we had a coffee and a chat in the theatre café. The play was good; very traditional with a group of characters who are having dinner in a posh Edinburgh house when a body is discovered upstairs. Gray O’Brien played Rebus; I remember him fondly from his days in one of my old favourite series, Peak Practice. He was suitably cynical and intelligent. The rest of the cast were very good too, and I enjoyed it, but the dialogue felt a little stilted from time to time, almost too witty to convey real feelings. It was an entertaining watch though, and afterwards Heather and I took the train back through to Glasgow (Heather got off the train at Croy, where she had left her car.) This is an important week for Heather, she retires on Friday, and we were talking about future plans and holidays.