Churchill in Moscow

by Howard Brenton

seen at the Orange Tree Theatre, Richmond on 3 March 2025

Tom Littler directs Roger Allam as Churchill and Peter Forbes as Stalin, with Julius d'Silva as Molotov (Soviet Foreign Minister), Alan Cox as Archie Clark Kerr (British ambassador to the USSR), Tamara Greatrex as Svetlana Stalin, Jo Herbert as the British interpreter Sally Powell and Elisabeth Snegir as the Russian interpreter Olga Dovzhenko in Howard Brenton's play concerning the meeting Churchill had with Stalin in Moscow in August 1942. (The main characters are historical, but the two interpreters are fictional).

The principal reason for Churchill's journey was to inform Stalin personally that the Allies had decided that it was impossible to launch an invasion of western Europe immediately: it would have to wait until at least 1943 (in the event, the D-Day landings and the invasion of Italy did not take place until 1944). He felt that a face to face meeting was essential to deliver this bad news in good faith, rather than relying on telegrams or telephone calls. But it was of course a delicate matter, as the German invasion of the USSR had begun and the battle of Stalingrad actually began while Churchill was in Moscow.

Brenton makes good use of the interpreters he has chosen to invent. At the opening of the play Stalin speaks in Russian, requiring the audience to wait until Olga translates into English before understanding. In an inspired move, Churchill then speaks in complete gobbledygook, so that once again we must wait for Sally to interpret before we understand his response. This technique is used sparingly; most of the time English is spoken throughout, though the business of interpreting continues unobtrusively except when either Station or Churchill mistrusts what is being said or requires (or impatiently dismisses) immediate clarification. The interactions of the wider delegations are suggested b y the occasional presence of Molotov and Kerr, while the teenage Svetlana wanders around practising her English by reading David Copperfield until she is briefly introduced to Churchill during a late-night confab between the two leaders.

This was of course an extremely consequential meeting; the seriousness of the issues is always before us even as the outsize personalities of both the leaders dominate the stage. Wisely neither actor simply imitates the historical character. Roger Allam has something of Churchill's awkward gait and rhetorical flair, and his curious dress sense (for much of the time he is in a boiler suit, except for being in a nightshirt one evening and formal wear for the reception the next). Stalin, in his usual military style dress, speaks with a West Country accent, cleverly indicating the Georgian provincialism sneered at by the urban Russian elites.

The presence of the interpreters not only provides some comic relief arising from their tasks. They also have a brief interaction outside their official capacities injecting a slight nod to the anxieties and prejudices of the ordinary people enduring the war and the volatile political tensions surrounding them. And Brenton uses the idea of interpretation and the responsibility of the translating staff to be accurate - whether literally or thematically - as an intriguing emollient to the fractious and potentially disastrous rift which otherwise seems impossible to bridge. Despite their qualms, it seems that the interpreters saved the day.

A thoroughly enjoyable insight into what to many (myself included) is a little-known meeting.