War Horse

It’s utterly amazing how powerful puppetry can set the emotions on high alert and the stage performance of Michael Morpurgo’s timeless War Horse story is a stunning example.

Currently on a revival tour, the 2007 production is taking the UK by storm, stopping off at Glasgow’s Theatre Royal, the acclaimed National Theatre performance had the audience in its grip and boxes of hankies at the ready.

Director Tom Morris and revival director Katie Henry cleverly have the audience under their spell as soon as Joey, the eponymous hero, trots onto the stage.

Within seconds, the three performers, Tom Quinn, Lewis McBean and Michael Larcombe disappear from the mind’s eye as the fascinating story unfolds.

Joey is at the emotional heart of the production which faithfully follows Morpurgo’s wonderful writing with young Albert (Tom Sturgess) raising Joey as a nervous young foal (Eloise Beaumont-Wood, Diany Samba-Bandza, Jordan Paris) on the family farm in Devon.

As Joey and Albert bond naturally, their world is shattered when church bells ring out at the start of the day to mark the beginning of World War I.

Joey is sold off to the military by Albert’s unsentimental drunken father Ted (Karl Haynes), despite a desperate intervention from his mum Rose (Jo Castleton) and dispatched to the front line.

Albert, then 16, follows Joey to France, dreaming of being reunited with his beloved horse and then clutching onto the hope of survival.

Director of movement and horse choreography, Toby Sedgwick has excelled with the actions so well, that the joint drilled performances brilliantly have the audience hearing every powerful grunt, breath and sweat as Joey begins his adventure as he tries to drag a plough through the fields of Devon to prove to Albert’s father that he is worth taking a chance on.

As he heads to war, he and Captain Stewart’s (Daniel Rock) horse Topthorn (Rianna Ash, Chris Milford and Tommy Goodridge) come alive on stage and the audience forgets the puppeteers and embraces the emotion of the story, which is as much about the bravery of the horses, as it is of Albert, barely a boy, who is sent to fight a war at the behest of more powerful men.

The story tells the true cost of battle, the heart-breaking and emotional encounters of the Germans and British soldiers who see each other’s humanity as they are thrust into a fight, not of their own making. Morpurgo highlights the futility of war and how history shows it is always the most vulnerable who pay the heaviest price.

Every part of this magical production from the acting and puppetry to the video projection above the stage, made to look like a page roughly torn from a book, the clever lighting by Rob Casey and dark music from Adrian Sutton, is well drilled and majestically performed.

War Horse runs at The Theatre Royal until Saturday 5^th April and then moves to The Empire, Liverpool from 8^th to 19^th April, Milton Keynes Theatre from 22^nd April to 3^rd May, Nottingham Royal Concert Hall from 7^th to 18^th May, Bristol Hippodrome from 3^rd to 21^st June, The Alexandra, Birmingham from 10^th to 19^th July. It then heads south to the New Wimbledon Theatre from 5^th to 16^th August, and on to the Leeds Grand from 19^th August to 6^th September before stopping at the Theatre Royal, Newcastle from 10^th to 20^th September.

It’s then back to Scotland and the Festival Theatre, Edinburgh from 2^nd to 11^th October before heading across to the Wales Millennium Centre, Cardiff from 15^th to 25^th October. The tour then rounds off at Norwich Theatre Royal from 28^th October to 8^th November 2025.

For ticket prices and more information, please visit: www.atgtickets.com and www.warhorseonstage.com.

Author Bio:

Rebecca Hay is an experienced travel writer and member of The British Guild of Travel Writers. Follow her adventures with her family on Twitter and Instagram @emojiadventurer and on Facebook via EmojiAdventurers2.

Photographs by Brinkhoff-Moegenburg