Ragnarok
Tortoise in a Nutshell in co-production with Figurteatret i Nordland and in association with MacRobert Arts Centre
A collision of ancient myth and modern spectacle in an enthralling and haunting theatrical world.
Available for touring from Spring 2027
A golden age is ending.
There have been three years of winter.
The sun hangs low in the sky, unmoving, and the bonds of kinship are failing.
A young girl and her brother battle forward, seeking a future in a promised land. Two souls in a sea of thousands, they move through a fractured world as dream and reality clash around them. A collision of ancient myth and modern spectacle, Ragnarok takes its inspiration from Norse mythology’s cyclical tale of the same name. It is a story about fate and self-determination, mortals and gods, the world’s end and its rebirth.
What is it to be one face in a million, walking through the end of your world?
The world is breaking.
Ragnarok creates a bold, haunting and multi-sensory theatrical world, populated by scores of hand-crafted clay figures and an atmospheric immersive soundtrack. Multi-award-winning Tortoise in a Nutshell create an enthralling new production that fuses forms to stunning effect, blending human performance, puppetry and hand-crafted live animation.
Awards
We are thrilled to announce that Ragnarok has been recognised at both the Critics Awards for Theatre in Scotland and the inaugural Profile Awards, which supports excellence in lighting design at a UK national level:
CATS Awards 2024
Winner: Best Technical Presentation
Winner: Best Music and Sound (Jim Harbourne – Composer, Sound Designer and Performer)
Nominee: Best Production
Nominee: Best Design (Arran Howie and Simon Wilkinson)
Profile Awards
Winner: Outstanding Achievement in Theatre, Simon Wilkinson, Lighting and AV Designer
Upcoming Presentations
7:00pm 15th May 2026: International Festival of Puppetry Art, Bielsko-Biala, Poland
7:30pm 23rd May 2026: The Studio, Capital Theatres, Edinburgh.
PAST Presentations
MacRobert Arts Centre: 3rd Feb 2024
Manipulate Festival @ Traverse: 10-11th Feb 2024
Beacon Arts Centre: 16th -17th Feb 2024
Dundee Rep: 20th-21st Feb 2024
Byre Theatre: 23rd Feb 2024
Eden Court: 27th-28th Feb 2024
Cumbernauld Theatre: 5th-6th March 2026
Lemon Tree: 14th March 2026
Platform: 27th-28th March 2026
Reviews
‘breaks the heart, and challenges the conscience’
The Scotsman / Joyce McMillan
⭑⭑⭑⭑
‘an enchanting performance piece which encapsulates all that is fantastic about visual theatre in Scotland’
Fringe Review / Donald Stewart
‘a performance unlike anything you have seen before’
Brig Newspaper / Isla Harper
⭑⭑⭑⭑⭑
‘a multi-sensory masterpiece of storytelling’
Lisa in the Theatre / Lisa Rusling
⭑⭑⭑⭑⭑
‘one of the most astute productions conceived – with a steady thumb on the pulse of the world’
Corr Blimey / Dominic Corr
⭑⭑⭑⭑⭑
‘a deeply moving story of despair and hope…told with unforgiving clarity through image and sound, and delivered with enormous restraint and subtlety.’
The Arts Desk / Dominic Kettle
⭑⭑⭑⭑⭑
‘Astounding and inspiring’
A Young(ish) Perspective / Cosette Bolt
‘A singular theatrical experience’
The Quinntessential Review / William Quinn
⭑⭑⭑⭑
‘next-level storytelling, deeply disturbing and organised down to the last detail’
All Edinburgh Theatre / Thom Dibdin
⭑⭑⭑⭑
a deeply textured and visually and musically unique production, a show not to be missed that will live long in the memory.’
North West End UK / Greg Holstead
⭑⭑⭑⭑⭑
Credits
Direction: Alex Bird
Performers/Devisers: Jessica Innes, Emily Nicholl, Jim Harbourne and Dylan Read
Associate Performer/Deviser: Shakara Rose Carter
Voiceover Artists: Jamie Robertson, Ally Baird, Diane Brooks, Jim Harbourne, Martin MacLennan, Catherine-Star Blanchford, Jason Stewart-Evans, Josh Thompson, Ellie Hunter, Ella Buchanan, Amy Walker, Morven Fyffe
Associate Artist: Melanie Frances
Dramaturg: Nicola McCartney
Designer/Maker: Arran Howie
Lighting & Video Designer: Simon Wilkinson
Composer/Sound Designer: Jim Harbourne
Sound Design Consultant: Kev Murray
Production Manager: Elle Taylor
Technical Manager: Josh Brown
Touring Head of Stage: Toby Macfarlane
Producer: Emma Stewart-Jones
Community Coordinator: Hannah Draper
Set and Prop Makers: Guy Bishop and Val Reid
Original Credits
Direction: Ross MacKay and Arran Howie - Performers/Devisers: Alex Bird, Emma Jayne Park, Ella MacKay and Isabel Sharman - Assistant Director: Melanie Frances - Composer/Performer: Jim Harbourne - Production Manager: Fi Fraser - Technical Manager: Andy Gannon - Set and Prop Makers: Kirsty Currie, Ben Whitney and Elspeth Chapman
Accessibility
Recommended for ages 13+ due to some violence and adult themes.
Our productions are highly accessible to audiences across the globe with opportunities for touch tours, captioning and international translations available upon request.
Participation & Engagement
An extensive engagement programme will assist Ragnarok’s tour, ensuring each venue visited has free accompanying workshops in its region, coordinated by Tortoise in a Nutshell. We will continue to access broad audiences, particularly young adults marginalised by their socio-economic context or background. An extensive research study undertaken by the organisation across 2020 has resulted in a change in how TiaN approaches productions and how touring should adapt to better serve audiences from across Scotland, specifically those systematically excluded from or underserved by the arts.
The workshops will involve creative masterclasses, exploring specific practices in the show such as multimedia theatre, film, drama. We will also run sessions on progression into the arts through demystifying roles and careers and identifying routes and possibilities for future progression, meeting an important need of arts employment advice and opportunities after the pandemic, amidst funding cuts in the arts and addressing the current figures of the huge fall in the numbers of working-class creative workers.[1]
Workshops in schools and college settings will explore key themes of the piece e.g. climate crisis, mass migration, and mythology. These areas may be particularly relevant for classes studying English and literature as well as philosophy and social studies. Facilitating discussions, debates and post show talks will allow audiences of teenagers and adults to come together and use the show as a springboard to discuss its key issues beyond the site of the theatre – how we live in times of crisis, what is the role of fate in shaping our destiny? What happens when we look at the apocalypse?
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2022/dec/10/huge-decline-working-class-people-arts-reflects-society
