Dialling the number for the hotel on the Isles of Scilly, I ask for room 26 and am quickly patched through. After a brief pause, a voice springs to life. Warm and vivacious, Sir Michael Morpurgo thanks me profusely for calling ahead of his visit to the North West as part of his tour with War Horse: The Concert. But first he wants to talk about Blackpool.
“It’s a writer’s performance,” he adds of the show, which sees him joined on stage by folk singer Ben Murray, who played the role of ‘The Songman’ in the National Theatre’s production of War Horse. “I’m there to weave my tale around Ben’s songs and it’s always brought a lot of joy to a lot of people.”“There’s a lot of pride involved,” Sir Michael answers.
The tale stirs people like few other narratives, as evidenced by its emergence as one of the most stunning plays ever written and performed, with the storyline and the emotive use of lifelike puppets making it a global tour de force. “When I got there, I saw a life-sized giraffe walking across the stage with visible puppeteers inside and the most extraordinary thing came across me. I had tears in my eyes. These extraordinary puppeteers became the life of the giraffe. It was just so moving - I thought that, if they could do that with a giraffe, they could certainly do it with a horse.
“Afterwards, she was saying how much she’d loved it and the next day’s papers were full of news about the Queen going to War Horse,” he adds. “Ticket sales went through the roof! Then the National Theatre got an invitation to take Joey to Windsor to meet the Queen, so he became the first horse puppet to be formally invited to an audience with the Queen!”
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