When an early draft of Rona Munro’s new play did the rounds, one of the first people to read it had a quibble. They said they had liked the way her original three James Plays had been based on historical fact – the stories of Scotland’s medieval kings, James I, II and III – whereas this latest one, James IV: Queen of the Fight, seemed to be made up. How else to account for the presence of two Moorish women in the Scottish court of 1504?
“I don’t think people know there were black people in Scotland that early in such a significant way,” says Munro. “People on social media are saying we’re crowbarring it in, but we’re really not. The history of black people in Britain has been ignored, marginalised and made invisible.”
