There's little in the way of sentimentality in much of the Original Theatre Company's new take on Sebastian Faulks's First World War novel by writer Rachel Wagstaff.
Given that it looks at a doomed love affair between English officer Stephen Raysford and Isabelle Azaire, the French woman trapped in a loveless and abusive marriage who captivates him, this is somewhat surprising. But as the frontline troops let off steam with an increasingly desperate-looking sing-song that opens the play before marching to their deaths in the Somme, any ideas of a conventional war-time romance are instantly blasted into the trenches with the emotionally complex grit of what follows.
Where Faulks's story was originally told via a linear narrative, Wagstaff's script, revised since Trevor Nunn's original 2010 West End production, weaves her characters through time-frames to create an ambitiously realised memory play which moves seamlessly between each period. Alastair Whatley's fluid production, played out on Victoria Spearing's versatile bomb-site set, focuses as much on Stephen's political awakening as much as his emotional one, as he finds empathy with squaddies just as Isabelle did with the striking factory workers she gave food to.
Jonathan Smith captures just the right balance of lovesick obsession and upper-crust bravura, while Sarah Jayne Dunn's Isabelle is a quietly aloof presence, and a stirring symbol of the purity and passion he yearns for. As Stephen clings on to the impossible memory of Isabelle, the fragile peace of his own battle-scarred psyche comes into question. Ultimately, he survives the tug of love and war, but what's clear is how much war messes up the lives of even those it doesn't kill.
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