Theatre

In October 2007, Nick Stafford’sadaptation of Michael Morpurgo’s ‘War Horse’ made the great leap on to the National’s Olivier stage. The book views World War I through the battlefield experiences of a horse called Joey. The production was a huge gamble in that, alongside the humans, the central character was a non-speaking puppet made of cane, gauze, plywood and bicycle brake cable. But audiences (adults and children) were instantly moved by Joey, a puppet that rippled with life despite the visibility of its handlers.

Directors Tom Morris and Marianne Elliott explain how their production came to life. Feature continues

Marianne, you have a reputation for text-based work. Why did you agree to direct ‘War Horse’?
Marianne Elliott ‘When Tom and I first met I remember thinking that it was just a completely impossible idea. I’d never worked in the Olivier, but had previously thought that I never wanted to. And so I said “Yes!”, because I wanted a different experience. At first, I was going to be the director and Tom was going to produce it. But I asked Tom if he would co-direct with me: in the past I’ve really liked it as a process.’

Is it confusing for actors?
ME ‘Because we come from different disciplines it did work itself out. But we both had a voice in everything.’
Tom Morris ‘At the start you were leading on how the humans speak.’
ME ‘Yes. And you led on the physical puppeteering side. Because it was such a huge project, it was very stressful, so it was great to have a cohort.’
 
Rae Smith, who designed the production, has said that it was a very organic process.
TM ‘We had a lot of time on it before we even got into rehearsals. So we would meet or do a bit of a workshop for a week or so and then make other shows before we would all come back again. That meant that ideas were able to evolve over a very long timescale.’

How do you direct a horse?
TM ‘Horses don’t have plans. You can’t apply a full Stanislavskyan character map to a horse.’
ME ‘You can apply it in moments. They’re hungry, or they’re moody, or they want to run.’
TM ‘We discovered that horses respond to the sound of a voice rather than to the words that are spoken. They have no sense of social responsibility, so a horse that is hungry keeps asking for a carrot long after it’s become boring.’
ME ‘Each horse has three manipulators and those puppeteers did a lot of physical work together. By the time we came to rehearse with them, they were very in tune with each other.’

Did you worry about the physical demands on those inside the horses?
ME ‘Yes ,we did, which is why we rehearsed a lot “unadorned”. Otherwise, every time you stopped a scene the
puppeteers had to sit down on chairs or they had to come out of the horse, which always took ten minutes. Ten minutes to
get in and ten minutes to get out.’
TM ‘ “Get into horse” sounds a bit strange when you hear it for the first time, but it’s forever part of our lives.’

Did you know during the previews that it was going to be so popular?
TM ‘No. We were very scared.’
ME ‘I think a lot of people were really worried about it. It’s a very, very expensive show and it was a huge risk.’

Was there lots of tightening then?
ME ‘Lots of rewriting. Massive changes. Scene cuts. Major re-staging.’
TM ‘The text operates alongside the visual staging, the music and the wordless scenes. It’s one of several storytelling languages. And we couldn’t really see how that all came together until an audience was there. We had to do the equivalent of a film edit having shown it to the audience the night before. And then say to the company “These are the last changes.” ’
ME ‘Every day. “This is absolutely it. We will not do it again.”’
TM ‘And then the next day we would go back and say “We thought we were right but we were wrong. Here are new lines
that you have to perform this evening.” ’
ME ‘New German lines. It does give you a very bonded company!’

Does it feel very different to be going into the West End?
ME ‘Not particularly, because the National is taking it into the West End.’
TM ‘We’re actually working with the same team who supported it during its time there. That’s fantastic.’
‘War Horse’ opens at the New London Theatre on Mar 28 (7452 3000).