The weather is cold, the house ramshackle, its occupants troubled, money is scarce, and there’s no end in sight. Sound like fun? You’d be surprised. What reads like the recipe for an evening of misery is in fact the setting for one of the most uplifting stage shows in recent years. Written and directed by Irish playwright Conor McPherson, Girl From The North Country has met with unanimous approval from audiences in London, on Broadway, and now on its national tour of the UK; and it’s easy to see why.

Set in Duluth, Minnesota, in the winter of 1934 (a particularly biting one at the height of America’s Great Depression), the show’s characters may be steeped in poverty but they’re full of heart. A guesthouse proprietor, his ailing wife, alcoholic son and pregnant teenage daughter form the centrepiece, with guests and itinerant strays passing in and out of their lives. Every one of them has a story to tell, love to share and, best of all, a song to sing.

Which is where the show’s not-so-secret weapon comes in, in the form of music and lyrics by Bob Dylan. But unlike most other pieces of musical theatre that’s gone before it, none of the 19 songs we hear were written for the show nor play any part in driving the narrative along. Many of them aren’t even particularly well known. Aside from ‘Like A Rolling Stone’, ‘Make You Feel My Love’, ‘All Along The Watchtower’, ‘Hurricane’ and ‘Forever Young’, the rest are mostly obscure album tracks. Yet despite Dylan’s lyrics not directly affecting the storyline, each song perfectly conveys a feeling at just the right time.

‘His lyrics are so universal that they instantly tell you everything about a character,’ says Paisley-born Ross Carswell, who plays guesthouse resident Elias Burke. ‘In a traditional musical, the songs are saying “this is what you should think or feel at this plot point”, but I feel like this music affects the audience in a different way. It doesn’t push it in your face, it leaves you to make your mind up. So much of Dylan’s music is really dark and yet uplifting at the same time; it’s a weird combination which you also find in this show as well.’

Both Carswell and fellow cast member Gregor Milne, who plays the angry, booze-soaked son of the guesthouse owner, trained at the Dance School Of Scotland in Glasgow before heading to drama school in London. Remarkably, but deservedly, Girl From The North Country is their first professional engagement since graduating. How do they feel a show set almost 100 years ago, on the other side of the Atlantic, can connect to modern-day British audiences? ‘It’s the idea that you just have to keep going no matter what,’ says Milne. ‘And especially after the last few years we’ve all had during the pandemic, it would have been so easy to give up. But all the characters in the show still keep pushing on and trying to make sense of it all.’

Both Carswell and Milne give their characters a real sense of gravitas as well as packing a punch with their vocal delivery, not just with solos and duets, but as members of a glorious, harmonised ensemble. Thanks, in no small part, go to Simon Hale, the man responsible for orchestrating Dylan’s music, who combined some of his songs into gorgeous mash-ups and arranged the vocal harmonies.

‘The arrangements and medleys are incredible,’ says Milne. ‘The way Simon shifts from song to song, and the atmosphere he creates is really cool. Conor always says the songs are the milk and honey to the vinegar in the scenes; and they are. They’re really uplifting and cathartic.’

Played live by a four-piece band, with additional musical back-up from quadruple-threat cast members, the music has an authentic period feel, partly achieved by only using instruments that were actually available in 1934.

‘It was important that visually and sonically I was representing the period of the piece, the Great Depression in America, so anything glossy felt wrong in terms of drama,’ says Hale. ‘I researched acoustic guitars and found one that had a cone inside it to make it sound louder. The violin, double bass and piano are obviously hundreds of years old, and then we chose a harmonium because I discovered that small portable ones would sometimes be carried around by preachers, which also gave us a sense of community and choir.’

Since opening in London in 2017, the show has scooped several awards, including two Oliviers and most recently a Tony Award for Hale’s orchestrations, which he says not only brought a sense of personal pride but is a victory for lo-fi creativity.

‘That was extraordinary,’ says Hale. ‘I’m very proud to be a part of this show, and the fact that it’s been recognised in this way is a great honour. I think using Dylan’s songs undoubtedly helped our cause, because people will have heard them and thought, “oh, I didn’t expect it to be like that” or “it doesn’t sound like that on his album”. But I was delighted not just for me but for the show and the industry. Because it’s just a small acoustic band, with no headphones, no click tracks, no electronics: what you see is what you get. It’s a very real, visceral piece of theatre and for something as raw and folk-based as this to get a Tony Award is just really exciting.’

Girl From The North Country, Theatre Royal, Glasgow, Tuesday 13–Saturday 17 September; Edinburgh Playhouse, Tuesday 18–Saturday 22 October.