She’s Behind You: The Cameron Lecture 2024/Pavillion Theatre 2025

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ “That a forty-something man in a frock, can deliver a lecture on pantomime dames and take the audience on a roller-coaster ride of emotions, hold them in their entirety in the palm on his hand throughout and see them rise as one to a standing ovation at the end, says everything that you need to know about the national treasure that is the phenomenally talented Johnny McKnight… just glorious. A five star treat.” Glasgow Theatre Blog

The Cameron Lecture – delivered through a partnership between the University of Glasgow and the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland – was established in 2019 by John Tiffany, the multi-award-winning theatre director and University of Glasgow alumnus, to honour his life-changing tutor, Dr Alasdair Cameron.

2024’s lecture, The Panto Dame (She’s Behind You), was presented by Johnny McKnight – dressed in full panto dame regalia and channelling one of his favourite characters, Dorothy Blawna-Gale. It takes a look at the person journey of McKnight’s pantomime performances in relation to the wider world.

John Tiffany, whose credits include Harry Potter and the Cursed Child in London’s West End and worldwide, said: “Alasdair was a hugely inspiring and inspirational teacher who was wonderfully kind. Following his premature death at just 41, it felt fitting to create a lecture series that celebrates and highlights his love of Scottish theatre and its practitioners. It is so strange to realise that this second lecture is being held in the 30th anniversary year of Alasdair’s untimely death. I am so thrilled that the exceptionally talented Johnny McKnight has agreed to give this year’s Cameron Lecture.”

“Alasdair’s legacy is extraordinary not just for us, his students and colleagues, but as a superb champion of Scottish theatre. I am delighted that Alasdair’s remarkable legacy is now being shared with a wider audience through these lectures and held at the University of Glasgow which he loved dearly.”

Another former student of Dr Cameron, Professor Deirdre Heddon, the James Arnott Chair in Drama and Theatre Studies at the University’s College of Arts & Humanities, introduced Johnny McKnight’s Cameron Lecture 2024 to a packed audience at the University’s Bute Hall. The piece was then revised and restaged at Glasgow’s legendary Pavillion Theatre in January 2025.