Stage: International box office hit War Horse is hot to trot at the Brighton Centre
It’s a theatre phenomenon, a breathtaking spectacle that combines the very best of acting skills, movement and cutting edge puppetry, a visual treat and a show that is both entertaining and deeply moving. War Horse is a box office hit and it’s coming to Brighton.
War Horse, which has been seen by over seven million people worldwide, completed its record-breaking eight year London run at the New London Theatre on 12 March 2016. It has won 25 awards including the Tony Award for Best Play on Broadway. War Horse has been seen in 97 cities in 10 countries, including productions on Broadway.
Latest saw the show in London before it embarked on this major UK tour and the experience far exceeded expectation. Words cannot fully convey this theatrical experience, seeing is definitely believing and like all great theatre the suspension of belief is the key to the success.
Michael Morpurgo’s best-selling book hardly seems the ideal project to bring to the stage. After all, the key characters are horses, and clever as horses may be, they cannot act. Enter Handspring Puppet Company, commissioned to create the equine characters that become the centre of this magical production.
An unmissable experience that will thrill
The puppets are fully life-size and each horse is operated by a team of actors, responsible for the movement and characterisation of each horse. We met some of the cast and talked to them about what it is like to work with these immense and complex puppets and it soon becomes clear that being a part of a War Horse puppet is all-consuming, each nuanced move considered, from standing to galloping – and it’s is equally physically demanding, each actor having a share in carrying the huge weights involved.
But at the end of the day this is theatre and it has to work as a dramatic entertainment. It does. It is only a few minutes in before you start to dismiss the presence of the puppeteers and really believe in the horses. And those horses are genuinely at the centre of the story with the human characters there to progress the narrative.
There’s sadness, it’s not an easy story in many ways, but it is full of hope and joy and there’s humour too as this epic equine saga unfolds. It works on many levels and will appeal to the very young as well as an older audience. It gives insight into conditions in WWI both at home in the UK and in France. It shows the desperate conditions of war from both sides and the bonds built by humans with humans and humans with animals. It will warm your heart, it will make you cry, and it will make you think.
This is theatrical entertainment at its very best, an unmissable experience that will thrill the experienced and undoubtedly create a new generation of theatre lovers.
Brighton from 25 January – 10 February 2018 Brighton Centre
Kings Road Brighton, BN1 2GR
Box Office: 0844 847 1515*
brightoncentre.co.uk/booking-tickets
