Best-selling book One Day to become new Scottish musical

The Herald Scotland

15-05-2025

David Nicholls' best-selling novel, which begins and ends in the Scottish capital, will be brought to the stage of the Royal Lyceum Theatre in Edinburgh next year under plans for its latest in a series of high-profile musical adaptations.
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Leading Scottish playwright David Greig, the Lyceum's former artistic director, is adapting Nicholls' book, which has sold six million copies and been translated into 40 different languages to date.
The novel explores the twist and turns of the friendship and eventual relationship between the two main characters, Dexter and Emma, over the course of 20 years.
The story unfolds after the pair meet for the first time at their Edinburgh University graduation party and revisits their lives each year on the same July day.
The Royal Lyceum Theatre in Edinburgh will launch a stage musical version of One Day in February. (Image: Will Maidwell)
One Day is the first major production to be confirmed by the Lyceum since it appointed a new artistic director, James Brining, who took up his post last month.
Greig was approached just over a year ago about a One Day musical by producer Simon Friend, who had spent more than a decade trying to bring an adaptation to the stage.
Greig is working with American singer-songwriters Abner Ramirez and Amanda Sudano - the husband-and-wife duo who record under the name Johnnyswim - on One Day, which will initially run at the Lyceum between February and April next year.
Author David Nicholls is best known for his book One Day. Picture: Supplied
The show will reunite Greig with Olivier and Tony-nominated theatre director Max Webster, who recently worked on stage adaptations of Macbeth and The Importance of Being Earnest, starred David Tennant and Ncuti Gatwa respectively, as well as the award-winning adaptation of Yann Martel's novel The Life of Pi, which was produced by Simon Friend.
Greig and Webster previously worked together on a musical adaptation of the children's book The Lorax and also collaborated on a new version of the Shakespearean play The Winter's Tale, which the Lyceum produced in Greig's first season at the helm.
The One Day musical is being billed as 'a celebration of love, fate, and the moments that define us forever, with a soaring original score, and the warmth, wit, and raw emotion of the novel that touched millions.'
Ambika Mod and Leo Woodall starred in the Netflix series based on the book One Day. Picture: Ludovic Robert/Netflix
Among the highlights of Greig's time as artistic director at the Lyceum was an adaptation of writer-director Bill Forsyth's classic Scottish film comedy Local Hero.
Greig's previously adapted Alasdair Gray's novel Lanark, the Greek tragedy The Bacchae and Roald Dahl's classic children's book Charlie and the Chocolate Factory for the stage.
Greig said: 'I was initially approached around this time last year by Simon, who had the rights to do a One Day stage adaptation. He had previously worked with Max and also knew James (Brining) very well from his time at the Leeds Playhouse.
'I felt that One Day was a very Edinburgh story. They needed somewhere to develop the adaptation. We had already done Local Hero and were doing Wild Rose. I felt that One Day would really work in Edinburgh and it would be a lovely musical for the Lyceum to do next. I felt it could be a real win for everybody.
'It has all worked out very well, we're all really thrilled that it's going to be happening at the Lyceum and we really hope we can pull it off.'
Greig's final show at the helm of the Lyceum was a musical adaptation of the hit Scottish feature film Wild Rose, about a troubled country singer dreaming of a new life in Nashville. Nicole Taylor, who wrote both the screenplay and stage adaptation of Wild Rose, was also the lead writer of the One Day series.
Greig said: 'The One Day series was a phenomenon when it came out, but I didn't watch it. It hadn't long been out when I got the musical gig, so I wanted to be careful that I didn't copy anything. I'm convinced I will adore the series because I adore Nicole's writing, but I felt I needed to keep a bit of distance to keep my mind clear.
'The strange coincidence over the last year was at the same time Nicole was coming to me for advice about how to write a stage musical and I have been going to her for advice about how to write a stage version of One Day.'
Greig can trace his One Day roots back to when he and Nicholls studied drama together at Bristol University in the 1980s and both in a student production at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 1988.
The production of the 17th century tragedy Sejanus His Fall, was directed by Matthew Warchus, who would go on to replace Kevin Spacey as artistic director of The Old Vic theatre in London. Nicholls' time in Edinburgh that summer is said to have inspired the author to write the book, which opens in 1988.
He said: 'We performed in the Fringe play in the room on the top floor of a venue on Chambers Street. There were eight of us on stage dressed in our underwear. I've no idea why, but I guess it sold tickets. I think that is when David fell in love with Edinburgh.
'It has felt strangely fated that I would not only get the chance to work on a story with which I've felt a kind of closeness, but also be able to celebrate the Edinburgh-ness of the story and open it at the Lyceum.
'A musical is a chance to reinvent and think about something in a different way. You have to sort of find a logic for its existence.
There was something for me about One Day being rooted in the Edinburgh moment when Emma and Dexter meet, but also its ending, on Arthur's Seat.'
Greig said he had jumped at the chance to adapt a book which he had 'adored' when he read it, but admitted its episodic structure made it 'tricky' to bring to the stage.
He said: 'One of the absolute joys of the book is how it approaches time passing, how it affects us and shapes us, and how were sort of the same people but also totally different as we age.
'David hit on an absolute truth, which is that time is a character in our lives. When I read One Day I totally knew who Dexter and Emma were and what they were experiencing. There is something really lovely about being able to explore that in real-time on stage.
'David writes about romance and love as we experience it in our real lives. It is deeper, stranger and harder.'
Greig said both Sudano and Ramirez, who began writing songs together after meeting in Nashville more than 20 years ago, have been 'obsessed' with One Day since they both read the book.
He said: 'Abner and Amanda have been one of the huge energies behind the musical happening. They feel the story is very close to them. Their songs are bringing honestly, vulnerability, beauty and heart to the show, which is allowing me as the writer to let the dialogue be as a dry and ironic as it is in the original book.
'Hopefully the show will have everything people want from it. It won't be sloppily sentimental because the book isn't sloppily sentimental, but it will have real emotion.'