After university, in 1993 he co-founded a drama collective with fellow students
Graham Eatough and
Nick Powell called
Suspect Culture, based in
Glasgow. Their work was highly influenced by
European theatre. Greig would go on to write the texts for almost all of their shows until 2004, including
Timeless (1997),
Mainstream (1999),
Candide 2000 (2000),
Casanova (2001),
Lament (2002), and
8000m (2004). His stand-alone plays, from
Stalinland (1992), began to be picked up by major theatres; the Traverse produced
Europe (1995),
The Architect (1996, made into a
film of the same title in 2006),
Outlying Islands (2002),
Damascus (2007) and
Midsummer (a play with songs by Gordon McIntyre, 2008).
Paines Plough produced ''
The Cosmonaut's Last Message To The Woman He Once Loved In The Former Soviet Union (1999) and Pyrenees
(2005). The RSC commissioned and produced Victoria
(2000) and The American Pilot
(2005). His sequel to Macbeth
, Dunsinane (2010) was premiered at the Hampstead Theatre by the Royal Shakespeare Company. The Speculator
(1999) and San Diego'' (2003) were commissioned by the
Edinburgh International Festival. When the
National Theatre of Scotland was formed in 2006, Greig served as its first Dramaturg and also wrote an adaptation of
Euripides'
The Bacchae for them. His adaptation of
Alasdair Gray's novel Lanark opened at the
Lyceum Theatre as part of the
Edinburgh International Festival in 2015. In 2006, he joined the board of the
Traverse Theatre. With local politician
Sarah Beattie-Smith of the
Scottish Green Party, Greig curated the political discussion show
Two Minute Manifesto which toured Scotland in 2015. In 2018 it was announced that he would adapt the classic film
Local Hero for the stage, with music by
Mark Knopfler. The production opened at Edinburgh's
Royal Lyceum Theatre in March 2019. Its 2020 transfer to the
Old Vic in London was postponed due to the
COVID-19 pandemic in the UK. Greig took over from Mark Thomson as artistic director of Edinburgh's
Royal Lyceum Theatre in 2016. He stepped down at the end of the 2024/2025 season, and was succeeded by James Brining in April 2025. He adapted
Aeschylus'
The Suppliant Women for the Lyceum in October 2016. The 2019 opening of Greig's first original new play in six years,
Adventures With The Painted People, at the
Pitlochry Festival Theatre was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The play was subsequently adapted for radio and later staged at Pitlochry Festival Theatre in 2021. ==Themes==