The NTS does not have a building to call its own, and has turned this weakness into a major strength. It's a simple idea really, with far reaching implications. The company strives to be inclusive and not to have a centre, in order to best account for the diversity of Scotland, but also to reach the people where they are, rather than ask the people to come to where the NTS is. Unlike any other national institution, NTS attempts not to be based in the central belt of Scotland where about 80% of the population lives, but to include the very rural and remote parts, as well as the Highlands and Islands.

The first production, "Home" is conceptually spot on as far as these ambitions are concerned. It consists of 10 different pieces of innovative theatre, all presented in a location which is not a theatre, in 10 different locations from Shetland and Stornoway to Glasgow. Thematically, they all explore the theme of home, but linked to the locality of performance, thus ensuring that a diverse exploration of what home means is achieved. A very fitting theme for the launch it appears. It has received a lot of attention, even before the staging of the shows.

Unfortunately though, I can only be at the Glasgow performance, and so everything I say is necessarily limited to this tenth of the project. I was excited by the idea that the performance would take place in one of the landmark tower blocks of Glasgow, 25 Soutra Place in Cranhill, Easterhouse. This is an area which suffers multiple deprivation, and the tower blocks have been home to mainly asylum seekers since 2000. It's a place I would not visit at dusk, so putting on a show outdoors in front of the tower block, with the action inside being filmed and presented to the audience on a screen, was daring in itself. A fabulous idea, and a massive spectacle of using seven flats, abseiling cameramen, massive lightening and sound systems, as well as a cast ranging from Billy Boyd of Hobbit fame to local youth theatre groups.

So, did it meet the expectations? The spectacle was amazing, it had to be said. And wee Tom (aged 5) didn't take his eyes off. The wind and cold were almost unbearable though, and the late start and longer duration of the play made the audience truly suffer. It was probably one of the coldest nights of the year, and the strong winds are always worse at the high rise buildings. It was hard to concentrate on the play, hard to understand what was said as the wind blew the voices about, in spite of amplification. The performance was visually stunning, the use of music gave it speed and linkage. What didn't work so well was the acting. Maybe it was due to a crossover between theatre and film - while the actors were in theatre like spaces, their acting was brought to us on screen, resembling more TV or film. The acting style was more theatrical though and as a consequence, slightly overdone. The scenes were all very short and didn't allow for character development, but I don't think that was something the play attempted to focus on anyway.

Thematically, "home" was explored through the relationship of two brothers and the relationship of the younger brother to his dead father. Mum, granny and ex girlfriends played parts as well, as did daddy's urn of ashes. Personal issues of identity and conflict were framed by surveillance state actions, half linking in with the current terrorism bill, cctv and the loss of civil liberties in the name of national security. Iraq featured heavily too, but in a slightly generalised way, as did nuclear power and its potential of being used as a deadly weapon. The surveillance theme worked well to an extent, as the tower block was in fact surveilled by the cameramen and us for the duration of the performance. However, it was too weak and too general a context to reach the realm of social criticism, and both the themes of Iraq and uranium lost any relevance to our times and place by being transformed into generic issues of leaving home and fictitious ideas respectively. The only moment of transcendence was the turning of tables against the MI5 kidnappers by the children of the tower block, in an act of defiance and reclaiming of their home, which was a hopeful and empowering end to the show.

I had expected that the location would also have an effect on the people portrayed in the play, but although one of the characters was suposedly from Iraq, there was no mention of asylum seekers. Similarly, the use of a general Scottish accent clashed with the location. It would have been more suitable to use Glaswegian dialect, anchoring the play both by language and character selection in 25 Soutra Place, Cranhill. The  most interesting conversation, which brought up contaminated soil on which the audience now stood, and the transformation of the old canal into the M8 motorway just next to us hinted at the possibilities of the play, had it had more length, depth and not been limited by the sheer spectacle of the performance. There's great potential, truely innovative ideas, and I look forward to future productions.