Theatre News

National Plans War Horse UK Tour from Autumn 2013

| London's West End |

20 October 2011

The National Theatre’s multi-award winning production of War Horse, currently running in the West End and on Broadway, will embark on a UK tour in 2013, according to The Stage.

Nick Starr revealed to the newspaper that the touring production is just one of several being planned in the next few years, including new versions in Canada, Australia and South Africa as well as foreign language productions in Europe and Japan.

The UK tour is scheduled to commence in autumn 2013, with specific dates and venues still to be confirmed. It is planned to run in tandem with the West End production at the New London, Starr said.

War Horse premiered at the NT Olivier in October 2007, returning for a second run the following year and
transferring to the West End’s New London theatre in April 2009. The production is co-directed by Marianne Elliott and Tom
Morris and designed by Rae Smith, with lighting by Paule Constable,
movement by Toby Sedgwick and music by Adrian Sutton.

In Nick Stafford’s stage version of Michael Morpurgo’s 1982 children’s
book, young Albert’s beloved horse Joey is sold to the cavalry and
shipped to France during the First World War. Unable to forget Joey and
still too young to enlist, the boy embarks on a treacherous mission to
find the horse and bring him home.

On stage, horses, children and other selected characters are brought to
life by life-sized puppets created by Basil Jones and Adrian Kohler for
South African puppet company Handspring. The puppets, and set designs by
Rae Smith, earned War Horse Best Design prizes at the Evening Standard, Critics’ Circle and Laurence Olivier awards.

Steven Speilberg‘s film version, which stars David Thewlis, Benedict Cumberbatch, Jeremy Irvine, Emily Watson, Tom Hiddleston and Peter Mullan, is due for release in the UK early next year.