War Game at The Bristol Old Vic - Bristol theatre review

Posted on: 2014-11-12

Our rating:

A ghostly reminder of those who sacrificed their lives at the altar of freedom - engaging and inspiring, heartbreaking and human, it's a show of stamina and skill and an affectionately rendered production.


 

In War Game, director Toby Hulse and actor Robin Hemmings have created a suitably moving, poignant tribute to mark the centenary of the First World War.

The one man show - based on the picture book novella by Michael Foreman - sees young, optimistic, slightly naive football fan Will travel with his friends from the bucolic safety of Suffolk to the Western Front and No Man's Land. There they take part in the historic Christmas Day football match between the British and German soldiers, a brief respite and glimmer of humanity amidst the horrors and bloodshed around them.

War Game at The Bristol Old Vic from 11-22 November 2014

The book War Game is a popular choice in schools to introduce children to the First World War. Translated for the stage, it retains its potency and doesn't belittle or condescend the events to pander to a younger audience; rather it embodies the spirit of self-belief and heroism against seemingly impossible odds. This is a vivid portrait of one man at war that’s accessible to all ages.

Robin Hemmings is excellent as Will, at first spritely and ebullient, but becoming gradually, reticently subservient to the madness and murder around him. Dashing around the stage, assuming different roles and costume changes, feverish one minute but solemn and scared the next, it's a performance of palpable emotions and jolting contrasts. A particularly effective newsreel-style training montage skilfully alternates between gruelling, touching and exasperating. 

We're high with excitement and hope as he interacts with the audience with handshakes, period songs, football techniques and mock gun-play; doom-laden and fearful as he lunges for cover amidst a barrage of incoming enemy fire. The language of football might link the events of 1914 to 2014 and traverse the complex narrative dynamics, but it pulses with a fiery, emphatic heart that resonates across the never-forgotten fields of lost generations.  

Served admirably by the lean, austere set design by Susannah Henry and the ambient aural soundscape of composer-in-residence Kieran Buckeridge, it's a timeless story of a young man at war, prescient not only for the period on and around Armistice Day but touchingly apposite for a generation of soldiers currently engaged in conflict. 

War Game is brilliant crafted theatre, a moving tribute to the soldiers who didn't make it back alive from the trenches through a series of honest, funny, painful storytelling beats and moving, impassioned vignettes. The final few minutes as Will lays coats slowly, reverentially down on the stage - a ghostly reminder of those who sacrificed their lives at the altar of freedom - is particularly poignant.  

Engaging and inspiring, heartbreaking and human, it's a show of stamina and skill and an affectionately rendered production. 

4/5

Reviewed by Jamie Caddick for 365Bristol

War Game is at the Bristol Old Vic from Tuesday 11 November to Saturday 22 November. Get tickets online here or call the box office on 0117 987 7877. 



Article by:

James Anderson

Born and raised in the suburbs of Swansea, Jimmy moved to Bristol back in 2004 to attend university. Passionate about live music, sport, science and nature, he can usually be found walking his cocker spaniel Baxter at any number of green spots around the city. Call James on 078 9999 3534 or email Editor@365Bristol.com.