War Horse
★★★★★ Exquisite
Festival Theatre: Thurs 2 – Sat 11 Oct 2025
Review by Rebecca Mahar
The latest tour of the National Theatre’s War Horse has arrived at the Festival Theatre, in a production as gripping and vital today as when it premiered nearly twenty years ago.
Nick Stafford’s play, adapted from Michael Morpurgo’s novel of the same name, follows the story of its titular horse, Joey, and his boy, Albert Narracott, as they navigate the peril of the First World War.
Tom Sturgess with Joey puppeteers Matthew, Lawrence, Rafe Young and Felicity Donnelly with the War Horse cast. Pic: Brinkhoff Mögenburg.
Albert’s father Ted (Karl Haynes) has purchased Joey at auction with all his mortgage money to spite his own bother Arthur (Gareth Radcliffe), who was also bidding. With the intention of selling Joey when he’s grown, Ted and his wife Rose (Jo Castleton) put Albert in charge of Joey.
Albert raises Joey into a fine riding horse, but when Arthur bets Ted that Joey can’t earn his keep as a plough horse, Albert must teach Joey to plough or lose him forever. All seems golden when Joey prevails, but with the ringing of church bells, war with Germany is announced.
When the army come enlisting new recruits and buying horses, Ted takes the £100 offered for an officer’s horse, without telling Albert. Devastated, the boy tries to enlist with Joey, but at 16 he is too young. When Joey is led away, the stories diverge: Joey, off to war, and Albert, left behind but determined to reunite with his horse, no matter the cost.
outstanding
Led by Revival Director Katie Henry, the human performers of War Horse are outstanding.
Tom Sturgess is an electric Albert. Vibrating with energy and exceptional movement work, he brings urgency, determination, and understated humour to the role. Whether interacting with other humans or with Joey, he is utterly compelling as the boy who chooses the danger of a man’s world for the sake of his horse.
Sally Swanson fades in and out of the story in the role of The Singer, originated by the show’s Songmaker, John Tams. She is a worthy successor to that legendary balladeer, with a guiding voice that is as strident or as soft as the narrative requires: an omniscient presence unifying the world of the play.
Joey puppeteers Matthew Lawrence, Rafe Young and Felicity Donnelly with the War Horse cast. Pic: Brinkhoff-Moegenburg.
Other standouts include Alexander Ballinger as Friedrich, a German officer who takes Joey and fellow cavalry horse Topthorn under his care. Ballinger’s performance is heartbreaking as Friedrich questions the German cause with continually deteriorating belief in what the war is all for. It is a testament to the intention of War Horse to depict ordinary people on all sides of the conflict.
Jo Castleton delivers a monumental turn as Rose, wrangling the complex emotions of mother, wife, and strong-willed woman with skill and subtlety. Meanwhile, Haydn Burke handles the role of Albert’s cousin Billy with alacrity. Pressured to enlist by his father, he convincingly transforms from the arrogant well-to-do cousin to the shellshocked trooper.
beating heart
The beating heart of War Horse is, without doubt, its puppets.
Designed and fabricated by Adrian Kohler for Handspring Puppet Company, the puppets are operated with Handspring’s signature enlivening technique, heavily focused on ensuring that every character lives through its breath.
Joey and Topthorn, as life-size horse puppets, are operated in rotation by a cohort of thirteen puppeteers. Each horse has three operators: Head, Heart, and Hind, who work as a cohesive team to give the inanimate materials that make up the puppets’ breath, movement, personality, and emotion.
A huge amount of study and work has gone into the effort of making the horses move and act like real horses, led by Director of Movement and Horse Choreography Toby Sedgwick, and maintained by Movement & Puppetry Captain Tom Gilbey.
Topthorn and Joey in War Horse on tour. Pic: Brinkhoff Mögenburg.
Every flick of an ear and toss of a head is intricately choreographed, as are the movements of the horse’s legs. The last isn’t perfect; there are places when the gaits are slightly off, but when it comes right down to it, it doesn’t matter. Taking in the whole picture and the overall effect of the incredible teams of puppeteers, and the belief of the human characters in the reality of the horses, they are simply magic.
Nor is this magic limited to the horses: ravens, The Goose, the machines of war, and every other puppet that appears on the War Horse stage are given equal attention to detail. The minutiae of specificity in both design and puppeteering give each of these characters their unparalleled individuality.
From the hilarity of The Goose to the visceral horror of a raven pecking at a corpse, and pieces of men and horses lying about the stage while Christmas comes at home, the puppetry of War Horse is essential to the humanity, sometimes tender, sometimes terrible, of its storytelling.
poignant and atmospheric
War Horse is made complete by its extraordinary sensory world. The songs of John Tams, music by Adrian Sutton, and sound design from Christopher Shutt create an aural landscape that sweeps through the play and straight into the audience’s heart.
Animation and projection design by Nicol Scott and Ben Pearcy for 59 add integrated illustration in an unobtrusive fashion, aesthetically tied to the sketchbook of Joey’ army rider, Lieutenant Nicholls, who promised to share his drawings of Joey with Albert, when the lad was unable to sign up.
Lighting Design from Rob Casey, riffing on Paule Constable’s original design, is monumentally successful, poignant and atmospheric throughout, allowing characters to emerge and fade away like ghosts at the edge of a memory, invoking the fading firsthand recollections of WWI that inspired Morpurgo’s book.
The homecoming that closes the play is not exactly a happy ending. It’s a hopeful one, celebrating those who lived to hold and sometimes to share their memories of the war— but also encapsulates the wretched brutality and trauma of all who sailed away from their villages and families into the war that did not end, but changed, all wars. It is an exquisitely painful catharsis; everything a tragedy should be.
Running time: Two hours and 35 minutes (including one interval)
Festival Theatre, 13-29 Nicolson St. EH8 9FT
Thursday 2 – Saturday 11 October 2025
Tue – Sat: 7:30pm, Matinees: Thu/Sat/Sun: 2:30pm.
Tickets and details: Book here.
Access performances:
Thurs 9: 7.30pm show will be captioned
Sat 11: 2.30pm show will be audio described, BSL interpreted, and have a touch tour before the show
Special events:
Pre-show Theatre Book Club prior to Saturday 4 Oct 2:30pm show
Post show Q&A after Wed 8 performance.
ENDS
