Yvonne Arnaud Theatre, Guildford – until 2nd November 2024
Reviewed by Liberty Noke
5*****
Birdsong is a stage adaptation by Rachel Wagstaff of the novel by Sebastian Faulks’. The play opens with a man in a graveyard he talks to the gardener about the war cemetery they are in and explains that he is looking for someone in particular then the scene changes and we are in pre war France. We meet Stephen Wraysford played by James Esler. He has travelled from England to stay with the family of a factory owner and write a report of the factory for his guardian at home. Stephen quickly falls in love with the factory owners wife, Isabelle (Charlie Russell) as he sees her helping to feed the poor workers in the factory. The whole first act is set here in France and we watch the Stephen and Isabelle’s love affair develop and Isabelle’s husband mistreat her. The act culminates as the couple are discovered by Isabelle’s step daughter. The audience watches in horror as Isabelle’s husband beats and torments her but there is far more anguish to come in act 2.
Act 2 opens in the trenches in France in World War 1. We meet a young soldier named Tipper, scared and anxious to impress his colonel who is revealed to be the same Stephen Wraysford that had fallen in love with Isabelle. We meet various other men in the trenches all of whom perfectly express the terror and comradery that would have been felt by the soldiers fighting the Great War. The soldiers tell stories of their loved ones back home and the fear they portray with their acting moved some of the audience to tears. When crawling through tunnels in the trenches a panel is lowered from the ceiling over the stage to represent this. The atmosphere of war is made real by loud bangs and flashes, there are moments when the audience are made uncomfortable.
All of the soldiers think of their loved ones to help them through the war and Stephen talks of Isabelle, of how they ran away together and lived happily until one day he came home to find her gone. Still he prays to survive so that he can find her again.
Birdsong is one of the best depictions of war I have ever seen. The creatives involved in this production brought the terror of war to the stage in Guildford in a way I have never seen before. The audience are wrapped up in a heart-wrenching story of love and loss hanging on the worst of every character. I cannot recommend this play enough although I also recommend you bring a tissue.