Wild At Heart

Kneehigh is the sort of name you trust with blind faith; you hear Kneehigh and, even if you have never seen one of their shows before, you know its worth a watch. My first experience with the company was their production of Hansel & Gretel at the Arts Centre last year and it would be an overstatement to say I enjoyed myself. For all intents and purposes I found the production a bit vapid whilst filled with wonderful ideas and stagecraft.

It was therefore quite alarming upon arrival in the Theatre this time round to find a set of frightening similarity; it was a set-up similar to the last time, and I feared the play would be little better. But hope existed in the fact it was an original piece and not a depressingly long stringing out of an originally very short and sweet fairytale; there is only so much one can do to Hansel and Gretel. With your own story you can spin the tropes out till the cows come home.

And spin them they did. There were all the classic pieces of a fairytale strewn across the floor and placed together in a hectic but utterly enjoyable narrative; essentially the story follows the tale of a man and his daughter who live in rural idyll, only for the devil to arrive one day and take the man’s daughter through clever bargaining. After a series of trials for the devil as he attempts to simultaneously capture and sexually assault the young lass, he is finally banished away by the purity of her soul and she flees from both father and satan into the forest. As the story ensues, we follow her journey into womanhood, of marriage and of motherhood, and of the many trials a fairytale heroine must face; war, deceit, solitude and the like.

It runs the risk of either sounding overly cliche or overly convoluted. Yes, at times the play falls back on easy tropes and at times plot points feel strung out. But what really matters is not the quality of the story being told but how the story is being told, and Kneehigh are masters of spinning the yarn. At no point does the show feel airy, at no point is it floppy or flabby; every scene has purpose, every technical effect serves only to illuminate the story not to show their technical ability (a crime Hansel & Gretel could sometimes be guilty of.) It is an action-packed and thrilling show that is brought to life by a very talented band, an equally talented cast (who genuinely move like gazelles upon the stage- it would be unfair to highlight any performer in the show as it is their ensemble ethic that works so well) and a brilliant set. The glowing pears, the baths of paint and the painting of the Queen are all ingenious touches (even if the portrait of the Queen clearly got severely in the way as the play went on and the actress manipulating it seemed to have to act around it) that serve to create one of the most mesmerising and heartwarming pieces of theatre seen in a long time.

The only critique to be levelled at The Wild Bride is that sometimes it seems afraid of being tough. The show does not start out in an easy way, but the various issues with the daughter as a sacrifice feel like a stringing out of a concept that, although clever, could have been resolved quicker (though it is a very powerful and moving segment) if truth be told and the war dance towards the start of act 2 feels awkward in its execution considering the movement and music has otherwise been very earthy and bluesy and suddenly becomes an interpretive routine to the sound of a recorded song. The Scottish Prince too, whilst played wonderfully, feels like a comfortable slipping into pantomime in a piece of theatre far subtler than that, but the eventual transformation of the character makes it work to this won over viewer.

The Wild Bride is in no way Wild- it is well thought out, carefully constructed and beautiful; a diamond of a show born from tightly compressed theatrical carbon. Get a ticket and see it wherever and whenever you can, it will delight and amaze you- my friends couldn’t wait for the interval to be over to get back in!

The Wild Bride is currently on tour and moves to Chichester, Cheltenham and The West Yorkshire Playhouse after this. For more details, go to kneehigh.co.uk