War Horse
*****
Wales Millennium Centre, Cardiff, Thurs 5 July
This incredible adaptation of Michael Morpurgo’s children’s novel is an absolute must-see. Every moment of this impeccably presented production is a stunning example of theatre at its best.
Even the empty stage has the audience talking about the set: a single strip of white, hoisted high above the coming action. Is it a cloud? A bony pointed finger? Then a man sings a folk song telling of the cycle of life and rebirth. Birds fly into the space, held high by their puppeteers on long poles. As they sail in front of the screen their lines of flight are sketched onto the cloud-finger, magically outlining the hills and small farmhouse of the pastoral setting.
It was a painting of a horse, Joey, signed by a Lieutenant Nicholls, that inspired the original novel. At the end of Act 1, our hero Albert tears a strip of paper from the bottom of Lieutenant Nicholls’ sketchbook. Designer Rae Smith has ingeniously used Nicholls’ sketchbook as the ever-shifting backdrop to the whole production. Initially, the lines are soft and fair. Then, after the Yeomen are called to war, Nicholls’ sketches become harsher, the lines thicker and the images more brutal as the carnage of the First World War takes hold.
The character that takes us through the horrors and, more importantly, futility of war, is Joey. First seen as a young colt, Joey is a mix of thoroughbred and draft, a hunter.
Albert brings out the thoroughbred in him, teaching him to race across the Devonshire hills. But Albert’s drunken, broken father wagers with his brother that Joey can be trained to work the farm. It is testament to Handspring Puppet Company’s design and execution that there is not a moment in the play that you doubt Joey could do any of these things. It is not, as is often said, that you don’t see the puppeteers, more that the puppet and its puppeteers are as one. Joey, and his war horse companion, Topthorn, are continually moving. There is a flick of the ears, or a brush of the tail. The flanks breathe and the shoulders twitch. This stunning level of detail is seen across all the animals used in the production. The carrion crows, when they land to feast on the dying cavalry, settle with gestures so exact it is like watching a lesson in avian movement.
Luckily for Joey, it is his crossbreed upbringing that saves him on the frontline. When Joey is captured by the German forces he is made to pull the cannons across miles of bogged trenchland. The company manage to stretch the few yards of distance from one side of the WMC stage to the other so that they felt like hectares of land across a deadly theatre of war.
Unlike many of the recent big-screen productions focusing on WWI, War Horse doesn’t apportion blame or favour one side. The distress in Friedrich Müller’s face at having to gun down a dozen horses because the British were fool enough to ride at his machine guns is something I will genuinely never forget. Both sides are treated with equal sympathy; war is the villain here.
Thankfully, there is plenty of humour and song to alleviate the atmosphere. The cast brilliantly move between the more conventional and stylised moments and the relationships with the characters both living and puppet are very real and very moving. If there is a standout in this wonderful production then it is thanks to the adaptation of the original, once forgotten book. Thanks to that, every facet of this touring production is stellar.
words John-Paul Davies