I hope to make audiences gasp, says Alan Cumming on new artistic director role

Stage and screen star Alan Cumming has said he wants to make audiences “gasp” as he prepares his first season as artistic director at Pitlochry Festival Theatre.

The multi award-winning star, who took up the post last month, also said he wants to “harness” his international profile to “take Pitlochry to the world and the world to Pitlochry”.

Speaking during an onstage Q&A event at the venue on Friday, the Perthshire-born actor said his appointment had come just as his profile was on a high following the success of the US version of hit TV show The Traitors, which he presents.

“I’m very aware that I have a reach and a power and an increase in that right now, which coincides with me being here,” he told the audience.

“I’m interviewed all the time, and I talk about this place all the time, and people are really interested.

“I think what was hilarious was that when I was announced as the artistic director, when this story broke, the exclusive was with the Hollywood Reporter.”

Cumming, who turned 60 last month, is currently programming the theatre’s 2026 season, which he said has the “mantra” of “revisit, revive and reveal”.

He refused to be drawn on what will be in it – other than saying it will include a musical – but said he is looking for pieces to make the audience “gasp”.

“I’m looking for things that I think would be magical to come and see,” he said.

“I really do believe the theatre is a place of magic, and it’s where imagination lets fly.

“I think all the things that I am planning for next year, the thing they have in common is this idea of possibility, in the style that they are done, or the style of the writing, or in the subject matter.

“For me, it’s about theatricality and excitement. My criteria of how much I enjoy something, or not even enjoy because sometimes I do this when it’s bad – it’s gasping.

“My criteria is how much I gasp at a play, at a book, at a piece of theatre, any piece of art.

“If I gasp, I think ‘wow, good on you, because you’ve made my body do something, something primal’.

“I want this theatre – and I think the future of theatre should be – to make people gasp more.”

Cumming, whose accolades include two Emmys, two Tony Awards and an Olivier award, said that in recent years balancing the books at the theatre had been a “constant battle” – particularly in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.

He said this probably explained why blockbuster musicals like Sunshine On Leith, which were guaranteed to get “bums on seats”, had been staged so often in recent years.

He also said the issue of financial sustainability had been a recurring theme in his meetings with executive director Kris Bryce, who was on stage alongside him.

“It’s a constant battle to keep the books straight, as I’m sure Kris will tell you, and is constantly telling me,” he said to laughter from the audience.

He added that pinned to his office wall is something he wrote during his first meeting in the theatre.

“At the end of the first meeting I had in this building, I wrote ‘try not to bankrupt this building’,” he said.

“Then I put underneath ‘but be bold, ballsy, and know your power’.”

He added that one of the dividends of taking “Pitlochry to the world and the world to Pitlochry” will be in the form of co-productions with other theatres.

He said it had just been confirmed that one of the shows being programmed for 2026 will also go to New York’s Broadway, which he said will provide income “outside of just what happens in this building”.

At the same time he stressed the importance of the theatre – both in terms of productions and the building itself – being a hub for the community, telling the audience on multiple occasions that it is “your theatre”.

He said: “I want you to come to this building, and I want you to tell me what you would like.

“Obviously I’m the boss, so I get to decide,” he quipped, “But I’m open to that.”

He continued: “This is your theatre. It’s a community. We live in a community. The theatre is all about community. It is, in fact, a community centre.

“It’s a church, and I want us all to be part of the congregation.”

He also said he wants his first season to celebrate the 75th anniversary of Pitlochry Festival Theatre – and the “ethos” of the man who first started it in a tent in 1951.

Cumming was speaking as part of the 2025 Winter Words Festival.