The setting is Moscow in 1930. The company are intent on conveying a sense of how decayed and dilapidated things were in post-revolutionary Russia. Studio 2a at C Soco is ideal. The peeling walls and ceilings as you enter and the bare, stripped walls take you into a world where human society is struggling to survive.The citizens of soviet Moscow deny that Jesus even existed. The devil appears and questions them. A writer known as The Master has written a novel about Pontius Pilate. His choice of title is revealing his work is not about the traditional submission to religion, but the questioning of the religious traditions handed down Pilate is an interlocutor. But this is enough to render him imprisoned and labelled schizophrenic. Only certain types of imagination are allowed.The Master and Margarita meet, and prior commitments melt... nothing is more important than that she is with him. Even a Faustian bargain can be considered.This show begins with the first two chapters being shown in some detail but no, this is not going to be a very long evening. That was necessary to set the scene. Then imagination takes over, and live music and dance come to the fore, along with fantastic scenes that convey much of the essence of the novel in brief.A newly-translated script by Russian-speaking members of the cast is used here. Everything flows as though naturally, until the storm calms. Before I came to Edinburgh, a Russian friend assured me that it was impossible to put Master and Margarita on stage. It is certainly very difficult, and people who know the novel well and purists may quibble but this company have certainly provided an excellent and provoking entertainment which takes its audience into a new and strange and disturbing world. And may lead them to the novel.For anyone interested in modern literature or the contemporary theatre this is a magic ride and surely one that will not want to be missed.
