Review: THE MAGPIE’S CALL at Dolphin Theatre

There is something special about being in the room for a world premiere, and Dolphin Theatre's production of Sheree Veysey's The Magpie's Call: October 1918 offers Auckland audiences exactly that. The play has deep roots in this theatre. An early staged reading, then titled October 1918, took place at the Dolphin in 2025 as part of its Dark Days series. The script has since been named one of twelve finalists for the 2026 Adam NZ Play Award and nominated for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize. Veysey describes it as a love letter to the generations who lived through the world wars.

The experience begins before the curtain rises. The foyer has been transformed so that the audience walks straight into 1918, welcomed by a front-of-house team dressed in period costume. Pre-show entertainment from The Diggers, singing songs of the First World War, sets the mood perfectly and turns an evening at the theatre into an occasion.

The setting is the Harrison backyard  and Bakery in Brisbane in the final weeks before the November 1918 armistice. Daisy Harvey is a frustrated ‘almost 17’ year old desperate for a life with more purpose and freedom. The play is centred on Daisy’s relationships with her mother, uncle and father at the front, and her tentative new relationship with Kiwi solider, Jack. And, of course her beloved Magpie, who parallels the frustration of confinement.

Poppy Harrison, in the role of Daisy Harvey,  is no stranger to the Dolphin, having worked backstage on many shows, and now, as Daisy Harvey this Epsom Girls' Grammar student takes on some demanding, mature material.

Lyndsey Garner, with a flawless Australian accent, plays Bea, who appears harsh towards her daughter. Yet every restriction comes from a fierce wish to protect her, rooted in Bea's own trauma as a young woman. She is a proud woman beginning to buckle under the strain: running the family bakery to make ends meet while wartime shortages leave some days with almost nothing to sell, frightened for her husband Myles at the front, and fighting her true feelings for his twin brother, Evan.

Richard Martin takes on the challenge of playing both twins, with a clear change of manner from one brother to the other. Evan, kept from enlisting by his poor eyesight, sees himself as a failure and uses alcohol to mask his pain.

Henk Tomkins, who comes to the stage after years of performing through dance, makes his acting debut as Kiwi soldier Jack Beattie, a young man damaged by the ravages of war. Jack works hard to hide his wounds, but  cleverly reveals the ravages of war, and the scenes where he relives the battlefield, amid flashes of light and the sounds of warfare, are among the most emotionally charged of the evening.

This is a technically assured cast, with the period and the language handled with care. 

The set is a quiet triumph. Anthony Lymath, in his first outing as a set designer, has created the back of the two-storey Harvey home and bakery on a dusty lane. It feels authentic and makes excellent use of the Dolphin's space. Justin Moyle's construction team built it, and Robyn Bull dressed it. A clever touch marks the passing of time: between scenes, the washing on the line changes, and the audience reads the days going by without a word.

One of the creative highlights throughout the story comes when Daisy and Bea read aloud Myles's letters from the front. Under Rhys Owen's lighting, Myles appears downstage through a side door and takes over, writing and speaking his own words. It is a simple, effective piece of theatre. Mike Daley's soundscape is equally creative. Rather than simply following the plot, it speaks to the heart of the play: the pain of war and the grief it leaves behind. It echoes the question Anna Baird poses in her director's note, asking whether, a century on, we have learned anything at all.

Baird, a well known professionally trained actress, stepped in to direct after the originally billed director withdrew. This is her first world premiere and her first production at the Dolphin.

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