Before arriving in Duns this May, we hadn’t heard much about DunsPlayFest. A few fellow playwrights had mentioned it as a warm, writer-focused festival in the Scottish Borders, but beyond that, we knew little.
We came out of curiosity, on a friend’s recommendation, hoping to catch a few new plays, be inspired and hangout with my writing crew. What we discovered was something much more powerful: a thriving, grassroots celebration of new theatre - one that places writers at the heart of everything.
DunsPlayFest isn’t like the big city festivals with red carpets and slick promotion. It’s something rarer: a festival built on community, passion, and the belief that everyone should have access to quality, original theatre. It felt like being welcomed into a creative family.
Images from DunsPlayFest 2024. Copyright: DunsPlayFest
A Festival with Grassroots Origins
The festival began in 2019, born from the energy of a local playwriting workshop led by Scottish writer Jules Horne. That workshop sparked something in the community - suddenly, local writers had the bug, and there was a real hunger to create new work and share it with others. Actor and writer John McEwen, alongside Duns Players (a long-standing community theatre group), helped turn that spark into something more: a fully-fledged festival.
From those modest beginnings - with just a handful of performances - the festival has grown steadily each year. Even during the pandemic, when in-person events weren’t possible, DunsPlayFest adapted by going digital, learning to stage and stream performances online. That resilience only fuelled its expansion. By 2023, audience numbers had tripled, and the festival had become a staple in the Borders arts calendar. The mission remained unchanged:
"Bring Brand New Theatre to the Borders."
Now, in 2025, the festival ran over nine days, featuring more than 80 events in venues scattered across Duns - from the grand Volunteer Hall (its main hub) to the historic grounds of Duns Castle. But even with all that growth, DunsPlayFest has kept its soul. It remains deeply writer-focused, volunteer-run, and community-centred, with a strong emphasis on accessibility and local participation.
As a first-time visitor and a playwright, that ethos felt immediately present. From the minute we walked into the Volunteer Hall, transformed with twin stages, a bar, and café seating, there was an atmosphere of welcome and possibility. Writers, actors, volunteers, and audience members mingled freely - one could sit next to a director during a workshop, then bump into them again at the evening cabaret.
The Plays: Venison and A Soul
While the festival offered an impressive variety - from folk music to improv to youth theatre - we came for the new writing. Two shows in particular stayed with us: Venison, brought by Edinburgh-based SlashHouse Theatre, and A Soul, a haunting new play by local writer Kevin Purvis.
Venison was, in a word, brilliant. Written by Huw Turnball and performed by a young, high-energy cast, it started out as a sharp dinner-party comedy and slowly twisted into something darker. Three friends arrive for a dinner hosted by Jerry, their friend’s boyfriend, only to discover the hostess is missing - and Jerry is disturbingly unfazed. The longer they stay, the more sinister everything becomes.
Turnball’s writing crackled with wit and menace. The audience was laughing one minute, holding its breath the next. What impressed most was the way it played with genre expectations: one moment we were in a sitcom, the next we were in a psychological thriller. Euan Shedden’s performance as Jerry was wonderful - alternately charming, awkward, and deeply unnerving. Without spoilers, the final minutes had the audience gasping and then laughing, as the play turned a mirror on our own taste for suspicion and true crime.
This is what DunsPlayFest does best - it gives bold, new work space to exist. And Venison, in all its dark comic glory, absolutely landed.
Later in the week, we attended A Soul by Kevin Purvis, a very different piece, but equally compelling. It’s a hilarious haunting battle of wits that begins at 3 a.m. in the study of an aging scholar who is visited by a foul-mouthed, theatrical “Soul Collector.” What followed was a tense, philosophical dance between two characters: one rooted in history and logic, the other in myth and chaos.
Purvis’s writing is sharp, lyrical, and full of surprise. The debate between these two characters - about mortality, belief, and the stories we tell ourselves - felt intellectual, deeply human and incredibly funny (the audience were in hysterics). John McEwan, as the scholar, gave a nuanced performance, balancing pride, fear, and a stubborn refusal to give in. Logan Robertson’s Soul Collector was a delight - flamboyant, vulgar, but layered with menace. There was an impressive use of creative special effects, lighting and set design to create a highly atmospheric and hauntingly eerie feeling.
Why It Matters
These two plays both showed the depth of talent emerging from Scotland’s theatre scene. More importantly, both were given space: the time, resources, and respect to be seen, discussed, and absorbed. That’s what makes DunsPlayFest special.
There’s a generosity of spirit here that we haven’t felt in many places. For a writer, it’s gold. You’re not treated like a cog in a machine - you’re treated like a maker of something valuable. The festival supports new writers not just with performances, but with workshops, mentorships, and a culture of curiosity. We came expecting a quiet regional festival. I left with a notebook full of ideas and the feeling that I’d stumbled into something quietly extraordinary.
DunsPlayFest may not be the biggest theatre festival in Scotland - but for new writing and emerging voices, it just might be the most important.
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