Sometimes Creation Theatre chooses the most beautiful and evocative settings in Oxford. And sometimes it just uses the best ones. This week, the Summertown United Reform church will be a polling place in the local elections. So what better locale to stage a new version of George Orwell's classic warning against totalitarianism, Animal Farm?
As you await the kickoff, draped sacking and pallets stained red and white combine with the plucked banjo strains of ‘Great Rock Candy Mountain’, making it seem as if a portion of Lon-Lon Ranch from The Legend of Zelda has teleported into North Oxford. The travelling troupe’s expertise is evident as this transformation appears quite organic.
Once the play begins, every trick in the book is pulled out to deliver Van Badham’s modern adaptation of the classic text. Clever audiovisual asides, excellent accent work and Sam Rayner's movement direction turn the four repertory players into a farmyardful of allegory. Without being an Animal Farm obsessive myself, it's hard to know where Orwell's genius ends and Badham’s brilliance begins, but it is wonderfully written. Director/Chief Exec Helen Eastman gets the most out of everyone, and the players themselves excel.
At the start, Emily Woodward as Squealer evokes Jess Hynes in W1A, slowly sinking towards Dolores Umbridge as the glimmer of youth fades from the revolution. Boxer doesn't actually appear on stage, but Nicholas Osmond surely embodies his work ethic, tentpoling the play as both antagonists, the Farmer Jones and the terrifying Napoleon. Anna Tolputt put herself into increasingly uncomfortable contortions as Snowball, and carried the narrative towards the end as salt-of-the-earth Clover. In this she was ably assisted by Herb Culano's crusty Benjamin, and he was a true all-court chameleon, the kind of player every true repertory needs giving the kind of performances that Creation must have had in mind when they began bringing the concept back; a changeling.
The bells and whistles are very enjoyable and I've tried not to spoil too many here, but suffice it to say that this Animal Farm is timely, modern, funny and poignant. Or to put it in language even a sheep could understand- four legs good, two legs - go!