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We go to the theatre perhaps to escape and be drawn into another world, to think, to laugh, to cry. But occasionally we see something that breaks the mould and surpasses our expectations, staying with us long after we leave the auditorium.

War Horse has humble roots at the National Theatre, where it was so successful that after a second run the creative team rose proudly with the show through to the West End, and now to the international stage on Broadway and in Toronto, Canada. It may seem to have won every theatre award under the sun (including two Olivier Awards and five Tony awards) and hold a record for the highest weekly gross for a West End play, but War Horse has retained its appealing modest nature, avoiding that flamboyant ‘big show’ feel. So what is it about it that audiences cannot resist?

The show centres around Albert, a young man who becomes unbreakably bonded to Joey, a horse on his parents’ farm. Albert is devastated when his father sends Joey to battle in WWI, and the story follows the journeys of the two characters as they fight for their country whilst trying to reunite. The story is adapted from Michael Morpurgo’s children’s book, and both the plot and the way it’s portrayed on stage are moulded beautifully, not forgetting a smattering of humour amongst the depths to bring the audience back to earth. Well-placed additions of authentic country melodies and singing help bring emotion to a peak.

Despite all these captivating ingredients, the main factor that creates widespread curiosity and awe is what the BBC show famously called ‘animal magic’. How on earth could you stage a live play where the main character and several of its co-stars are equines? Unlike making the film, there’s only one shot each night, not to mention trying to manage half a dozen horses backstage. The answer, breathtakingly realistic puppets, keeps the audience engrossed throughout, and you find yourself becoming heart-wrenchingly attached to Joey. The elegance and grace, the attention to detail, the fluidity; before you know it Joey is real, and he ensures that your eyes remain glued to the stage.

Tears were aplenty and emotions were running high as the audience filed out, but without anyone being sure why. And perhaps it’s the best shows where you can’t put your finger on exactly what’s moving; simply every successful component comes together and forms a masterpiece.

The Guardian recently ran an article listing the top five regrets of the dying and right at the top was “I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.” You can almost picture the fairy tale old lady now – lying on her death bed, all crinkly skin and pristine white sheets, imagining how much more fulfilling her life would have been if only she’d had the courage to tailor make it; to mould it into something that reflected what she really believed in, rather than accepting an identikit life. Matthew Morrison’s play reminds us though that things are a bit messier than that. Even if you manage to work out what’s true to you, acting on it and finding fulfilment through it is not all that easy.

Rob (William Owen) is an investment banker. It’s not going all that well though. He’s not particularly good at it and he finds it stifling, oppressive and it gives him nosebleeds. So he decides to jump ship before he’s politely pushed and do something he finds valuable instead. Having dabbled in teaching he heads for the classroom full of aspirations and good intentions; he’s not just going to teach them English, he’s going to teach them about life.

Of course they aren’t particularly interested, in fact his words of wisdom are so rooted in his own life they can barely understand him. Morrison’s rather depressing point seems to be that in a world of individuals it’s very hard to connect; we end up as bespoke shapes that never quite mesh.

It’s a play that has plenty of merits, but it’s undermined by being over written. Morrison, you feel, doesn’t quite trust in “less is more” and he succumbs to the temptation of showing us too much, a temptation that a stronger editor would have overcome. Still his central character is complex and intriguing (beautifully played by the excellent Owen) and there are some ear catching lines too, my favourite coming from the pragmatic, quietly spoken head teacher who says of his students “they can still remember what oblivion feels like.”

Alison McDowall’s inventive set works well too, blending the classroom and the outside world neatly and reminding us that the influence of our schooldays is never far away.  Helen Skiera’s sound design is equally imaginative – indeed early on it’s scene stealing – while the supporting cast are, for the most part, strong. It all adds to the nagging sense that this is a production with high values that should have been more tautly constructed.

Peter Clapp

Brightest And Best runs at the The Half Moon, Herne Hill until 10 March

14 years on and after countless cast changes, various celebrity stars and enough fishnet tights to depopulate the world of cod, Chicago is still giving the West End the ol’ razzle dazzle and a sassier production you’re unlikely to find.

The world-dominating musical merges crime with celebrity in the cut-throat, cabaret world of 1930’s Chicago. Roxie Hart (Sarah Soetaert) is awaiting trial for the murder of her lover, after her long suffering, sweet natured husband Amos Hart (James Doherty) finally twigs that she’s not as virtuous as he first thought. But under the $5000 dollar wing of lawyer Billy Flynn (Terence Maynard), she becomes a criminal star, outshining her fellow inmate Velma Kelly (Rachel McDowall) and setting up a battle for their lives and celebrity status.

With the support of an on-stage jazz band the cast tell the story through a series of world famous cabaret songs from All That Jazz to When You’re Good To Mama. In some ways this makes for a paired down experience. There’s barely a change to the set and hardly a special effect in sight, everything rests on the music and dance, neither of which disappoints. The opening number oozes with sexual tension and from the get go there’s a sense that the characters want nothing more than to be adored, a conviction that leads them to near ruin.

The petite Soetaert returns to the role of Roxie, giving her a Marilyn Monroe sweetness that belies a manipulative mind. She’s charming throughout and is the backbone that holds the show together. McDowall’s Velma Kelly makes for her perfect Vaudevillian partner; at 6 ft she looms over the petite Soetaert, all cut-throat and dominating, her daddy long-legs physique still hugely graceful.

There’s little doubt that Chicago is one of the modern classics, a stalwart of Broadway and the West End, and what’s more it’s a slice of musical history that’s well worth catching.

Peter Clapp

Chicago is booking until 26 Jan 2013 at the Garrick theatre

Once, quite a long time ago, Ryan O’Neal tried to persuade us that “Love means never having to say you’re sorry”. Although I’ve never fully understood what was meant by this (and anyway, I disagree), the drive to explore what ‘love’ might be – how it works, what it means and how we can learn to live with it – continues to pre-occupy great swathes of art and literature.

If, in Love Story, love is represented either by the absence of transgression or apology, elsewhere it might present itself in sacrifice, devotion or white-hot desire. In Frantic Assembly’s Lovesong, love presents itself in all these different guises, as the company explores the love between one couple and the life, or lives, they live together.

They are lives shown not ‘in order’, but in snapshot, reminding us that although a life is linear – its course decided and defined by what is said, or done, and why – Lovesong gives room for movement, for manoeuvre, for reflection not only on what was and is but on what might have been, who might have been, and how.

As it stands, William and Margaret, later Billy and Maggie, appear, often simultaneously, at both the beginning and the end of their lives together. These lives, we learn early on, have not been easy or uncomplicated, but they have been marked throughout with a love that comes to define the couple both as individuals and in unison. In youth, full of love and lust and only the highest of hopes, William and Margaret fall over themselves, and each other, to demonstrate their love, to celebrate and perform it and to press themselves indelibly together, forever. Later in life, reflecting not only on what has come before but on what will, sadly but inevitably, come ‘after’, Billy and Maggie unpack not only the physical souvenirs but the memories of their time together and the ways in which they have been moulded by their attachment to each other.

Not all the memories are good – the finest line is traced at times between what happened and what ‘might have been’ – but regardless of these troubles, William and Margaret have become Billy and Maggie, together at the end as at the beginning, joined by a love that may have changed, may have been forced to, but that remains as strong as ever. Moments in which all four actors are on stage, as the present and the past collide or simply co-exist, demonstrate perfectly the need each couple has for the other, the ways in which it is as impossible to escape who you were as who you have become.

It is in the presentation of this that Frantic Assembly, as ever, excels. Seamlessly blending dialogue with heart-wrenching moments of music and movement, the company’s commitment not only to the physical and internal lives of their characters, but of the ways in which these can be presented and performed, results in a truly beautiful production, at times unexpected but always first class.

The love story we see in Lovesong is no fairy-tale, rather it is one couple’s song, their truth. Lovesong explores the ways in which we might become the people we are, were and still might be, if only we allow for love, for the incomprehensible, giant unknown to sweep us repeatedly away.

Lovesong runs at the Lyric Hammersmith until 4 February and tickets start from £12.50.

Kate Richards TheatreFix Reviewer

It is safe to say there are more than a handful of Nutcracker productions being simultaneously performed around the country, so how do you even begin to decide which one to attend this Christmas?

Ballet, contemporary and modern twists are heavily featured throughout the various show’s listings, leaving every theatregoer inundated with choice of style, venue, and atmosphere. I can’t think of anything more Christmassy than a timeless production of The Nutcracker, and last night I paid a visit to the London Coliseum to see the fantastic English National Ballet dancers sparkle to their hearts’ content.

What should I expect?
In a nutshell, the show completely dazzled me. If you want diamantes, frolics and spectacular effects then this version of The Nutcracker is for you. Wayne Eagling has produced yet another outstanding production which was neither too childlike for the adults nor too far removed for the many children in the audience who were completely enthralled.

Humour ran throughout the fast-moving plot and images of many family Christmases were reflected in Eagling’s precise choreography and the immense technical skill of the dancers. The Mouse King, danced by James Streeter, was particularly outstanding in his intense portrayal of his fight with the Nutcracker, and Elena Glurdjidze completed embodiment Clara’s passion and devotion to the Nutcracker. Eagling utilised the backdrop of snowy Edwardian London which perfectly complemented the festive tale alongside Tchaikovsky’s famous score. The audience was taken on a hot air balloon ride across the London skyline to The Land of Snow and then beyond to the magical Puppet Theatre where more talent and precision were waiting. Such talent continued throughout the evening through the dancers’ additional roles created from so many corners of the world, providing even more Christmas excitement. The Mouse King was, of course, eventually vanquished in this perfect happily-ever-after tale.

Do I need to know anything about dance?
Not at all. The pure beauty of the dancers will whisk you away on a sparkling adventure to The Land of Snow, suspending disbelief in such a classic Christmas production.

It might be worth noting, however, some of the impressive facts and figures that add the background of this magical version of The Nutcracker. For example, there are 400 Swarovski elements sewn onto each of the nine Sugar Plum Fairy costumes, with the value of these amounting to approximately £10,000 in total, generously donated to the company. That’s a lot of diamantes! Each Sugar Plum Fairy costume requires over £2000 of man hours and fabric, which reminds the audience that behind this superb interpretation of the classic story lays the rest of the team that placed the show on stage.

How much will it cost?
Tickets at the London Coliseum range from £10-£67 to making English National Ballet’s Nutcracker extremely accessible to Christmas budgets.

Wayne Eagling’s The Nutcracker runs at the London Coliseum until 30 December 2011.

Jessica Wilson TheatreFix Reviewer

The Society of London Theatre, the organisation behind TheatreFix and Official London Theatre,  is looking for someone with previous writing experience who is keen to work at the heart of London’s theatre industry.

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Full-time Editorial Assistant
Salary: £21,000 per annum

Ref: EA

We offer a competitive salary and benefits plus access to personal development and training opportunities. For a job description and application pack, please e-mail jobs@solttma.co.uk quoting the appropriate reference.

Closing date for applications: 21 Dec 2011 at 17:00. Only successful candidates will be contacted.

SOLT is an Equal Opportunities Employer.

It’s coming up to Christmas – well its December anyhow – a time that makes each and every one of us wish we were five again and believed in Santa (or is that just me?). Watching kids films, eating so much chocolate I think I might be sick and dancing around to Mariah Carey is usually the way I go about reviving my five year old self, but I thought I might try something a little more sophisticated this year. When I heard the fantastic film (and originally book) Howl’s Moving Castle had been adapted for the stage and Stephen Fry’s voice was involved, I decided it might be just the thing to get me in the festive mood.

Walking into the auditorium at Southwark Playhouse, the beautiful pop-up style set stood like an open page, waiting to tell us a story. When the show began, the stage came to life as bright projections whizzed over the castle and its walls, transforming it into many different landscapes and homes and interacting with the actors in a way that made the magic feel more real. The storytelling felt like an amalgamation of the traditional and the modern – the voiceovers lending a wink to the classic story tape and the flying projections offering filmic visuals.

However, despite its impressive array of storytelling techniques, the piece fell short at actually telling a story. The characterisation was as two-dimensional as the set and there wasn’t enough character development to make the audience really care what happened to their hero and heroine at all. Whilst I completely appreciate the difficulties of compressing a complex story into a short amount of time, the piece really did suffer by paying more attention to impressive visuals than to the story itself.

There were some lovely moments in the show where the visuals and stage action really came together, but these moments were too few and far between to create the necessary magic for the audience. Daniel Ings made a very watchable Howl however, with buckets of charisma and delightfully over the top acting. Indeed there was an element of pantomime to the piece (no bad thing in my book) but it was lacking the joy and life which makes a pantomime so fun to watch.

Howl’s Moving Castle was very watchable but it lacked that magic touch to get me in the festive mood.

Collette McCarthy TheatreFix Reviewer

Howl’s Moving Castle plays at the Southwark Playhouse until 7 January.

Milk presents weave a dark and twisted tale in a show that is creative, clumsy and chaotic – a reimagining of what we perceive to be the ‘average fairytale’.

Loosely based on the French literary folktale, the plot revolves around a charming nobleman wooing and marrying a young virgin girl, Pam, and inviting her into his macabre existence. Adam Robertson is Bluebeard; a charismatic male lead with magnetic charm, an impressive Movember-esque moustache and a closet full of skeletons – of his previous two-dozen wives. After Pam discovers his perverse secret, she struggles to avoid the fate of her predecessors.

The most impressive element of this production is, undoubtedly, the intricate design. A limited budget did not limit the creativity of this set, with the staging including a complex system of rigging, leavers and pulleys from which props were lowered from the ceiling. A particular highlight was when a coat hanger was suspended and a shirt was placed upon it, instantly portraying a male love interest, from which, a beautifully crafted dance was created.  Striking Brechtian lighting was used to simple but great effect.  A classic overhead projector was the main source of stage lighting and the team created countless effects with card cut-outs and projections.  A magical backdrop was created as water and oil were poured into a backlit Tupperware, casting eerie shadows and forming an ethereal atmosphere. A tandem bicycle positioned upstage, when peddled, lit a singular light bulb – a charming addition to an innovative light design.

The live music and song also deserve a mention. With catchy melodies and haunting harmonies, the group are talented musicians as well as performers. Live sound effects were a great source of comedy throughout – snapping celery at the mention of breaking bones and equally evocative effects.

While many of the performances were strong, there was still an air of under-rehearsed haphazardness.  It was evident that one of the performers was a recent addition and, unfortunately, the moral ‘message’ of the play fell slightly flat and concluded in a rather abrupt fashion. Despite this, it is rare to see a production with such imagination and creativity and while a little polish is needed, the innovation and talent on display is enough to make for an enjoyable evening.

Bluebeard: A Fairytale For Adults plays until 3 December at the Battersea Arts Centre. 

Stephanie Moore TheatreFix Reviewer

Sitting in a room at the Theatre Royal Stratford East theatre, waiting to get aboard a minibus and start Roadkill, our usher stood up and made a safety announcement about the piece, finishing up by telling us all that she hoped we enjoyed it. The woman next to me chuckled in reply – “I’m not expecting to enjoy it” – and the rest of the 20-strong audience, including myself, nodded in agreement.

When going to see a play about child trafficking one does not enter into the experience with a sense of merriment, indeed the atmosphere in the waiting room was one of nervous anticipation. It makes you wonder what makes a person decide to see a play such as this – are we seeking entertainment, knowledge, or catharsis? Whatever reason the audience entered into this experience for, the piece itself most certainly delivered.

The piece began aboard the minibus with the main character Mary hopping on, excitedly moving about from seat to seat telling us all in a charming manner about her plans to be a real Londoner when she grows up, with a good job and a big house. By the time we have reached the venue proper the audience have developed a bond with this excitable youth and her boundless energy has cured any pre-show nerves.

Mary’s joy is soon eradicated as the sordid and abusive house in which we find ourselves takes its hold on Mary. The site-specific location is uncomfortably warm and an anxious atmosphere lays heavy in the air. There is no escape in the small rooms of this house from the horrors we are to witness and they are all the more affecting for their proximity. Mary is trapped and must deal with whomever, and whatever, comes through her door and so must we.

The play is littered with animation, projection and voiceovers, allowing for the details of Mary’s abuse to be explained and impressed upon the audience without it feeling too vulgar or graphic. The animation was beautifully crafted and very moving, and the film footage, especially of the panting men on the ceiling, brought a chilling dimension to the piece. However, the many forms of projection did, for me, cause Roadkill to feel a little muddled in its aesthetic.

The acting was outstanding throughout, providing an emotional drive that had most of the audience in tears by the end of the action. The multi-role play of John Cazek allowed for a number of male figures to be represented in order to complicate what could have been a clear cut ‘badie’ role. Throughout the play the issues of trafficking were explored in a way that avoided the piece feeling too preachy or one-sided. The writing was well developed and embraced the shades of grey within the characters, showing the topic in a complicated and multifaceted light.

Roadkill wasn’t enjoyable, it wasn’t supposed to be. What it was, however, was a powerful, overwhelming and beautifully put together piece of theatre that I’m sure I will remember for a long time.

Roadkill runs until 20 November and tickets are priced £18.

Collette McCarthy TheatreFix Reviewer

For the first time in over 25 years, Edward Bond’s Saved is on stage at the Lyric Hammersmith. Kate Richards attended an after-show Q & A to see if it would shed some light on some of the issues raised in this controversial play.

Saved is a play I didn’t think I would ever see on stage. I remember studying the text at university and grouching about having been born in the wrong era. I wanted to have been around for Bond, and Orton, Pinter and Osborne. I still wish I had been, but I wasn’t. There are some plays that so capture the mood not only of the time in which they first exist, but of a certain population ever after, that they remain not only recommended but essential viewing.

Describing Saved as the one he always most wanted to direct, Sean Holmes believes the play has a “deep contemporariness”, identifying parts of and places in society that are as relevant and prevalent now as they ever were. Certainly, his production was almost alarmingly contemporary and Holmes makes no attempt to over-emphasise the 1960s setting, preferring instead to focus on the characters within the text. At times we could have been watching EastEnders. This isn’t something I had considered when reading the text, but the ease with which the characters fitted into certain social and cultural stereotypes emphasises the play’s entanglement with questions and problems that endure, perhaps because they, or we, have yet to find satisfactory solutions.

As the play’s contemporary relevance was discussed afterwards, Morgan Watkins (Len) suggested that now, as then, it is the extent to which society remains inherently unequal that is to blame for behaviour such as that illustrated not only in Saved but on our own streets in recent months. I don’t know to what I extent I entirely agree that ’society’ as a whole is solely to blame for the behaviour of individuals, but I do think that in this case another of Edward Bond’s suggestions – that neglect of society is equal to the neglect of the humans within – holds true. Certainly, as Watkins also pointed out, parts of society are shallow, and within these shallows breed strong, often incendiary feelings and beliefs that will at some point explode outwards, unavoidably touching and tainting those around them.

Another unexpected element for me was the laughter. Speaking at the post-show Q & A, Lia Saville (Pam) admitted that the rehearsal period had left the actors unsure as to what would strike an audience as funny. And it’s true: Saved, as Edward Bond says himself, is a strange play that largely refuses to tell you how it is strange. Instead audiences, and actors, are left to find their way through a play teeming both with humour and with horror; sometimes shocked into laughter and at other times into silence. What is important, said Watkins, is there is a point to it all and a lot of the time the balance is so precise as to tip into discomfort.

And so to the famous scene that sees a baby stoned to death. Saved is, after all, ‘the play with the baby’. This is how most of the young cast knew the play before rehearsals began, and in many cases said that it was working backwards from this point that presented the most challenges, not only in interpretation but in presentation too.  Although some cast members did have experience of the text from an academic point of view, others admitted that, until the opportunity to audition arose, they had never read the play and knew little of it. I can’t help but think that their new perspectives can have been nothing but beneficial, forcing both cast and crew to think outside the play’s considerable notoriety to find their own version of events. Regarding the baby incident specifically,  Bradley Gardner and Tom Padley – playing Barry and Pete respectively – said that while they had initially been excited to “get on with it”, in fact this pre-rehearsal bravado proved no match for the matter itself and they were quickly discomfited by the “reality” (and yet not….) of what they were actually doing. Padley said that in order to properly commit, he had to disconnect entirely and become the “horrible bastard” that the script demands. This, I think, throws up a whole other set of questions – is Pete a bastard? (I personally find him one of the most repellent characters in the play). Are any of the boys bastards? Or are they victims of their situation? Both actors referred throughout to Holmes’s repetitive rehearsal process, saying that the extent to which the scene was broken down and rebuilt stage by stage, line by line, was helpful not only from a technical perspective but from a personal one.

Assistant Director Ashley Scott-Layton echoed the performers in respect to the scene as a difficult one to handle. He said the aim was to demonstrate to the audience the extent to which there is a gradual build up to the scene in question. He points out that, at first, the boys are attempting to help the child and that the violence is not pre-destined. I have read other references to the ’sudden’, even unexpected nature of the violence in this scene, and I have to say again that I disagree. I see violence on all sides throughout the play, emotional and physical, and I don’t – or can’t – believe for a second that there was any other way the baby scene was ever going to go. Relating the baby to the problem of society, Bond has said that in this case, the baby finds itself at the bottom of the pile. I would argue that, through their actions, the boys demonstrate that in fact it is they themselves in this position. The baby is the collateral damage they, and we, see all round us.

So, finally to the other dilemma within Saved. Is anybody saved in Saved? Is it ironic? And if someone is saved, or even if they’re not, can the same be said, or seen, today? Though Saville points out that Pam is the only character who actually asks to be saved, it remains ambiguous as to whether she actually is. I found one of the most saddening and truthful moments in the whole play to be the point at which, in response to Mary’s belief that “there’s always someone worse off in the world”, Len points out that “Yer can always be that one”. It is this, I think, that most resonates with me; the idea not only that these characters might represent those ‘ones’, but that they know it. And it kills them.

Saved runs at the Lyric Hammersmith until 5 November and tickets start from £12.50.

Kate Richards TheatreFix Reviewer