I saw my first London theatre production this evening.  Wow!  I picked a great one to start.

A colleague on the Executive Committee of the International National Trusts Organisation (INTO) pulled together a group of six of us to see the New London Theatre’s production of War Horse, at the end of two days of meetings at the National Trust’s London headquarters.   After a late afternoon tour of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (motto:  it is amazing what you can build when you have the world’s treasures at your disposal), we walked past St. Martin’s in the Field, the National Gallery, and into the theatre district.  London is a great place at night!

War Horse is an incredibly moving story of horses conscripted to fight in World War I, told in a remarkable way with life-sized puppets.  The trailer that I’ve attached to the end of the post gives an idea of the realism these actors and puppeteers achieve, but seeing it live tops any video.  As one of my colleagues said, “I knew I was going to cry at the end of the show, but I didn’t know whether the story would turn out well or sad.”

I won’t tell, just in case you get the chance to see it.  If you do, please treat yourself.  It is, quite simply, one of the best shows I’ve seen in live theatre in a decade or more.

I’ll give other updates from London later, but wanted to post this while the euphoria from the evening was still strong.  The Sunday Times got it right, when they called the show “Stunning.”

More to come…

DJB