Lincoln Center Theater Welcomes WAR HORSE Author Michael Morpurgo Tonight, 5/6

Lincoln Center Theater presents War Horse author Michael Morpurgo in a one-night only special event, An Evening with Michael Morpurgo:  From Devon to Broadway, tonight, May 6 at 7:30pm at the Vivian Beaumont Theater. The Vivian Beaumont Theater is where its co-production, with the National Theater of Great Britain and Bob Boyett, of the 2011 Tony Award winning Best Play War Horse continues is record-breaking run. Tickets to An Evening with Michael Morpurgo, priced at $15, are available now at the Vivian Beaumont Theater box office, at telecharge.com or by visiting www.lct.org.

In An Evening with Michael Morpurgo, the NY Times Best-Selling author will take the audience on his journey with War Horse, starting with tales of his childhood in bombed out London during World War II, to years later when during a chance conversation with a World War I veteran in a Devon pub he learned of the role of horses on the front lines of the Great War. 

This conversation inspired him to write a novel about World War I England, France and Germany seen through the eyes of its protagonist, a horse named Joey.   That novel, War Horse, would years later be adapted for the theater by playwright Nick Stafford with the Handspring Puppet Company, directed by Marianne Elliott and Tom Morris, and become a world-wide stage phenomenon. In addition to Mr. Morpurgo reading excerpts from his novel, the evening will also feature songs from the production.           

Britain’s Children’s Laureate from 2003-2005, Michael Morpurgo is the author of more than 100 children’s books and most recently became a NY Times Best Selling Author when his novel of War Horseoccupied the top spot on the NY Times list of Best Selling Children’s books.  Mr. Morpurgo was awarded an OBE for services to literature, a Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres by the French Govenmnent and, with his wife Clare, an MBE for services to education.  He and his wife are the founders of Farm for City Children, a charity that exposes inner-city children to life in the country.