Reviews

One reason often given for mountain climbing is ‘because it’s there’. But that does not necessarily make it anything less than arduous for spectators. And this has to be the Everest of adaptations, a helluva ambitious effort, though sadly, some of the audience did not make it past the first interval. 

Those who attended the second night however were indeed richly rewarded as the production gathered pace. Many of the inventive set pieces were genuinely spine tingling.

You must have read the book, of course, so just to sum up: early 19th century Russia, where the life of Pierre Bezuhov is entwined with that of Count Rostov’s family: daughter Natasha falls in love with Pierre’s friend, Andrei Bolkonsky, whose sister, Maria makes a match with Rostov’s son, Nikolai. 

War and Peace, Photo By Robert Day

The latter, together with Andrei and Natasha’s former beau, Boris, have all fought in the war.  So far, so good?  Anyway, the action spreads far and wide throughout Russia, and everybody seems unimaginably wealthy. The costumes certainly could not be faulted, from rags to riches, peasant to Prince.

And it does look like a cast of thousands at times, but such a lot of information to take in and such a lot going on, two and three events in one scene, then others which begin before the previous one has ended.

Some of the effects are quite splendid: huge frames evoke mirrors, doorways and windows while a grand piano is astonishingly versatile: rostrum, cart, bed.  Indeed, considering the main setting is a cavernous ballroom, it is almost magically transformed to exteriors, from a railway station to a battlefield. 

However … all very well when something is symbolic but if you do not grasp the significance, forget the first syllable, and make the word plural. Mime can be most evocative or pretty disastrous. The cut and thrust of war struck my companion as something out of Adam Ant’s ‘Prince Charming’ video, then in one ball scene, cutlery is put to all kinds of odd uses, including a lorgnette. And the deathbed loses poignancy when a corpse is dragged round the stage on a sheet.

Louise Ford is an enchanting Natasha, maturing before our eyes, a foil for the romantically brooding figure of Andrei (David Sturzaker). Marion Bailey makes a marvellous Countess Rostov, and an even better Anna Pavolvna, queen of the salons, while Hywel Morgan may have had early James Spader in mind when portraying the imperious Anatole Kuragin.

The two father figures are tremendous, each in his own way, Geoffrey Beevers as the amiable, rather foolish Rostov (male equivalent of the ditsy Lisa, Andrei’s first wife) and Jeffrey Kissoon as the forbidding Prince Bolkonsky, who terrorizes his pious daughter.

Love or hate the play, it is an incredible achievement.  And plaudits to the theatre for making it possible to share such an experience. Makes you wonder though, what’s up next?  A memorable production of Proust…