Access Winchester - War Horse press launch

As part of Access Winchester myself and Faith managed to gain entry into the press release of Warhorse debuting at the MayFlower theatre in Southampton.

We were allowed to film in and around the venue which gave us exclusive access as well as an insight into how the theatre production is performed, the construction of the horse and how the puppeteers operate.

We were given front row seats where we could film the entire launch which included a presentation from Jimmy Grimes, the puppetry director who talked us through how the horse was built, the way it moved and how they brought the puppet to life.

Jimmy explained the origin of the puppet from original performances seen in South Africa where these life like puppets gave the directors inspiration and how they developed and transformed these ideas to create the horse.  The evolution of puppetry is very relevant in this performance as Jimmy explained the main aspects are focus, breath and fixed point to create an authentic replica of a horse.

Jimmy went through and showed via slides how the horse was constructed, the materials used to build the puppet and how they designed the horse to be as realistic as possible. This was achieved by adding multiple joints that could be operated by the puppeteers, pretty much identical to that of a real horse to create fluid movements when the horse walked, trotted, cantered or galloped. The horse also 'breathed' as they used such flexible and light weight material that the movement of the horses 'heart' was visible to the audience, changing in pace dependent on the movement, a very clever technique that reinforced the realism of the puppet.



After Jimmy had finished the presentation, we were able to see the horse in full action which was an incredible sight as we got the full war horse experience. We could see how the horse moved, the way it interacted with the actors and hear the sounds made and produced by the puppeteers which were amazingly realistic. After a demonstration of the horse we were able to sit in on a Q&A with the puppeteers and the song man who explained how they spent weeks researching horse behaviour, the noises they made and the way they reacted to people to fully understand the dynamics and thoughts of the animal.

We were lucky enough to grab an interview with all of the puppeteers where we got  some brilliant inside info into how much practise and training goes into operating the horse as well as some exclusive horse sounds that they willingly performed for us. We also managed to get another interview with the song man, Tim Van Eyke who gave us some insight into his previous performances and his role within the show.