Oh What A Lovely War

As the steady march of First World War arts programming continues across the country, Lakeside Arts Centre and New Street Theatre's latest offering is their turn at putting their head above the parapet and venturing forth into a densely populated no man's land. The co-produced version of Joan Littlewood's Theatre Workshop's Oh, What a Lovely War, acting as the accompanying show for their visual arts exhibition All Quiet in the Weston Gallery, is however a lively cut above some of the other productions that have been on show. 

Originally developed in 1963 and then later turned into a film by Richard Attenborough, Oh, What a Lovely War is a curious mix of Marxist agitprop, vaudeville and seaside variety show. The play, in its charting the road to and course of the First World War through songs and sketches, makes the events of conflict into a rollercoaster of juxtapositions which ratchets up and plummets down from high camp farce to heartbreak. As for the performers, New Street Theatre have put together a tight and vocally strong ensemble of fifteen talented and capable locally based performers. The moves, harmonies - especially in the brilliant satrical a cappella church scene - and scene transitions were highly polished and belied the hours of rehearsal.

Martin Berry's production is however less the 'end of the pier' entertainment of Littlewood's original and more end of the dustman's round with the whole world of the play created from pallets, water drums and an old bath. This scrapheap chic of the production's design and costume is slick and stylish and the punked Pierrot clown costumes further adds to their attempt to make this an engaging and contemporary look on events a century ago.

At odds with this however was the lack of updating in the text - there were still references to the issues of the sixties which could have been tweaked to look more closely at events like the Arab Spring, Iraq, the situation in Gaza, or the current government. Equally with the text being pre-the abolition of the censor, many of the rich metaphorical references alluding to the needless sacrifice of so many lives in each 'Big Push' could have been drawn into clearer focus. While it would be verging on a re-write, Littlewood, the great Brechtian, would have approved at some more modern nose-thumbing at any figure of authority.

This was also why some of the decisions in the production felt a little odd. Joe Heap's cockney Field Marshal Haig meant the one of the text's prevailing images of the nobility sending the proles to the slaughter was lost. A multitalented cast, there was also some consistency that went missing when a guitar was produced for just one song. Consistency too is a problem for the script which becomes a bitty song-cycle in the second half. It could have done with something which assisted seeing the songs in context as it felt like a drop off from the fantastic first act. If forced to make any further criticism, the national stereotyping perhaps went a step too far, but was mostly very funny.

The production is, in spite of this admitted nit picking, really enjoyable and makes some bold decisions in its staging. There is a clinical detachment to such an ending, proving Stalin's quotation: “a single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic.” We are far more moved by the death of a single soldier at the end of act one, rather than the presentation of casualty figures at the end. While it doesn't tug the heartstrings emotively, it is the bleak unforgiving facts of the war and makes for an effective didactic close.

The real stars are the set and the ensemble though, who combine to bring the text alive. Most of the cast had standout moments and their togetherness was key to being able to pull the whole thing off. Highlights wise, Evangeline Osbon, admittedly helped with a lively song, was great to watch in Belgium put the Kibosh on the Kaiser and Gomolemo Nyakale's bright eyed naivety changing to war-torn weariness was one of the few narratives that lasted throughout the show. Ellie Turner-Atwell and Damien Ebanks too, as the split role MC, had a great watchability, sparring off both the audience and each other. Katherine Tye, as both performer and musical director, seemed to be everywhere playing the piano and characters seemingly simultaneously and Judie Matthews was a strong Emmeline Pankhurst.

As a show which comments and criticises the war to end all wars, this will be one that crops up again and again over the next few years until 2018. I would hazard a guess that it would take a very polished professional troupe to outdo this version in terms of its pizzazz and tightness. Well worth catching this week. 

Oh What A Lovely War is at Lakeside Arts Centre until Saturday 26 July 2014. 

Lakeside Arts Centre website