Kevin Parr was always good at “mimicking” teachers when he grew up in the Douglas area of Dundee. He had a knack for making people laugh.
But never in a million years did the former pupil of Powrie Primary, Balerno Primary and Craigie High think about becoming an actor.
That all changed when Kevin, now 54, was in his early 40s and someone asked if he’d step in to cover a sickness absence for a community drama group at Dundee Rep.
Persuaded to “gie it a go!”, the Dundee postie laughs that he was “caught like a rabbit in the headlights” during that first performance, playing a character called Glen.
However, he was bitten by the acting bug and he hasn’t looked back since.
Still delivering letters by day, his CV includes plays at the Rep. the Fringe and voiceover work for cartoons, video games and documentaries.
Now, as he appears in a touring play called The Collie’s Shed, he’s looking forward to his first ever appearance at the Byre Theatre in St Andrews on May 11.
What’s The Collie’s Shed about?
“The Collie’s Shed is about the miners’ strike in 1984,” he said, adding that it was first performed at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2022 and 2023 to critical acclaim.
“It’s written by an East Lothian lass called Shelley Middler.
“It follows four retired miners – Billy, Tommy, Charlie and Glen – and how their lives are still affected by the strikes that took place 40 years ago this year.
“I play one of the retired miners, Billy. It also features four younger actors who play the retired miners in their youth.”
Kevin explained that the play starts off with the four retired miners at a ‘Men’s Shed’ in East Lothian.
There, the former Bilston Glen Colliery workers make things like walking sticks and bird boxes to keep them occupied.
One of them had moved away. But he comes back, and this causes friction because, during the strike, he broke the picket lines and went to work to feed his family.
The frictions from the past “bubble back up” when the Scottish Government carries out a review into the policing of the strike.
The play cuts back to the characters as younger men in 1984.
“It explores the dilemmas faced by people who were skint, had no money, had no food,” said Kevin.
“It’s just a balancing act between how these guys deal with that within themselves and their friendships.
“It’s very powerful. A very well written play.”
What are Kevin’s memories of the miners’ strike while growing up in Dundee?
Growing up in Dundee as the youngest of a family of six, politics was rarely discussed in his house.
He laughs that it was “more about who’s getting the most tatties and mince”.
However, he vividly remembers watching the miners’ strike on the news as a child, and it impacting places like Fife.
“I remember it specifically because it was kind of jaw dropping, eye opening, kind of ‘bloody hell what’s going on here?’” he said.
“Seeing these lines of police and these guys clashing with them and they are clashing with them back and the horses. I do remember it well.
“I didn’t realise how much of an impact it was having at the time because you were a young boy – you kind of think ‘it’s people going on strike, I don’t really understand what that’s all about’.
“All you are thinking about is your mates and your fitba’.
“I think about the impact it had on people even more now seeing the documentaries on TV after 40 years.”
Kevin explained how writer and director Shelley Middler, who’s also an actress, remembered hearing stories from her miner grandfather and evolved these into the play.
As well as watching documentaries, he researched the strike by joining an ex-Scottish miners Facebook group.
‘Powerful’ feedback from mining villages
When the play was at the Fringe in 2022 and 2023, audience members often came up to them at the end in tears, saying how powerful it had been.
He added: “People would say ‘I grew up in a village and still stay there and there’s people even now, 40 years who to this day still don’t speak to the bloke across the road because he went to work’.
“It’s still going on to this day. It’s a shame really.
“But people obviously have a lot of passion and hard feelings.”
During his interview with The Courier, Kevin’s broad Dundonian accent is apparent throughout.
This came in to its own when he starred in Dundee street poet Gary Robertson’s The Scaffies.
He laughs that because Gary writes in phonetic Dundonian, you’d get the script and say “what the hell is this?”
But he’s no stranger to adapting his accent for the role. For The Collie’s Shed, he puts on an East Lothian/Edinburgh accent and, for voiceovers, he’s even done American.
He can also put ‘BAFTA winner’ on his CV because a few years ago, he provided the voices for all the male characters in an entry to Abertay University’s ‘Dare to be Digital’ competition.
“I don’t think they won the Dare to be Digital competition,” he said.
“But they got put forward for a Scottish Games BAFTA and they actually won it.
“It was called Mr Montgomery’s Debonair Facial Hair. There were different voices – a king, a farmer, a sailor and a typical rough Scotsman and stuff like that. I was part of the team and thought ‘I’m claiming that!’”
The Collie’s Shed, Byre Theatre, St Andrews, May 11 and King’s Theatre Kirkcaldy, May 16.
Conversation