We spoke to cast members from All My Pretty Ones at Birmingham Rep — a new stage play exploring the Nazi massacre of Oradour-sur-Glane in 1944. The drama follows three present-day medical students who stumble into the shadow of this forgotten atrocity, confronting themes of guilt, silence, and historical memory.
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00:00It's a quiet French village in 1944. By the end of the day, it's a ghost town.
00:06The buildings torched, the people massacred and no real justice ever served.
00:11That's the backdrop for All My Pretty Ones, a new stage production of Birmingham Rep.
00:15It tells the true story of Oredor-Serglan, a place where Nazi soldiers rounded up over 600 civilians and killed them in cold blood.
00:24One of the worst atrocities in Western Europe during the Second World War.
00:28And yet, for many in Britain, it's barely a footnote.
00:31But this isn't just a history lesson.
00:33The play drops three modern-day medical students into the wreckage of that memory.
00:38A German, a French woman and a Brit, each with their own blind spots, baggage and beliefs.
00:44They end up in a guest house near the ruins, where the past isn't quite finished with them, and neither are their own consciences.
00:51What starts as a detour becomes a slow confrontation with guilt, silence and complicity.
00:56All My Pretty Ones asks how trauma gets passed on, not just through families or nations, but through culture, through silence.
01:05It explores how ordinary people get swept into horror, not because they're evil, but because they look the other way.
01:11I spoke to members of the cast, including Katie Cannon, who plays Marie Christine, to find out how they approach the piece that's as emotionally demanding as it is politically charged.
01:23So, the script, it's a very shocking script.
01:29I mean, it's about a true story, and I always love performing characters from true stories.
01:35But yeah, the script is very shocking and very relevant to today, even though it's set in the past.
01:40It's things that, you know, come again and again, like war.
01:44And I think, yeah, that's what drew me to it.
01:48It felt relevant and important.
01:52Yes, yeah, I agree with that.
01:54I think the dual temporality as well, I found it really interesting, because obviously you do have the timeline of the 1940s.
02:02Well, the story of what happened in the village of Orador is told, but also the story of the people that find out about the tragedy today.
02:13And I found it really clever, the way the two are intertwined and the relationship between the characters, without spoilers.
02:21But yeah, a really, really nice script.
02:24Very, very touching moments as well.
02:27So, Mary Christine is, yeah, just a very modern, intelligent, but fairly naive, particularly about history, and begins the play.
02:49And she even has a line which says that the stories from this play just belong in books, in rooms that no one visits.
02:57That's one of her lines.
02:58But she goes on a big journey.
03:00And by the end, she, yeah, I won't spoil anything, but she does go on a journey of self-discovery and learns about her own connections.
03:09And, yeah, completely understands the relevance and how we need to keep the story being told by the end.
03:15And that's for your character.
03:17Yeah, so I'm playing Pierre, who is in the 1944 timeline.
03:22He's a father and a husband, a farmer.
03:26And I think all he cares about at this point is just cows and farm life, basically.
03:35And when you get the, when the Germans start to invade France and this sort of sacred territory and way of life that he and his family used to have, then it's obviously a shock.
03:51But it's also something that, you know, that everyone wants to end, this, like, appropriation of culture by the Germans and things like that.
04:02So, yeah, I think my character is actually very daring, I think.
04:08He doesn't like the Germans as a proper French guy.
04:14And, yeah, he's actually quite stubborn and quite upfront in the way he will deal with them because he wants all that invasion thing to stop.
04:24So, yeah, it's very interesting, I think, to see that, knowing that there's always this, like, fear factor.
04:32You never know.
04:33You can be shot at any time, obviously.
04:36And, yeah, everyone in, well, no, that's a spoiler.
04:40I'm loving it.
04:40Wonderful.
04:44The events at Orador, have I pronounced that right?
04:47Yeah.
04:47I agree.
04:48Fantastic.
04:49They aren't well-known in Britain.
04:50Do you think this production helps shine a light on forgotten histories?
04:55Yes, I definitely think that.
04:56And it is, it is something that isn't well-known.
04:59I mean, obviously people, we, you know, the Second World War, as I say, is well-known.
05:04But it's these little stories which have such parallels to things that are happening in today's world as well.
05:09Yeah.
05:09And it's, yeah, these stories of such brutality.
05:15And also it's how we get to know the characters and their lives and we get to know them.
05:20And I think often we think of the Second World War as history that we don't think of the people as family members or, you know,
05:29but we're looking at this for a very personal side.
05:31And I think it really does help people make the connection.
05:36Right.
05:37Yeah, absolutely.
05:38I think it's funny.
05:40Well, not funny, but it's interesting because the events are quite well-known in France, but not so much abroad, especially in the UK.
05:50And, yeah, as you said, it's just, it's very relevant with the situation today in the world.
05:57And, you know, such kind of evil can still happen nowadays.
06:03Obviously, it's a real shame because human beings never learn in a way.
06:09But, yeah, I think it's really important to tell that story for historical reasons, but also to spread a message of that should never happen again, ever.
06:20So, yeah, having the past and the present, I think the way it affects the mood on stage is it brings the stories from the 40s into not just the characters on the stage,
06:42but into the audience's mind, but into the audience's mind, because I think they will obviously feel similarities to the modern-day characters.
06:52And then watching them almost, I don't like, it's not like interacting, but, you know, it is sort of like interacting with those old days.
06:58It helps the connection.
06:59And, yeah, I really, I hope the audience walks away feeling connected to the past and feeling empowered to stop, you know, well, to try their best to not let it happen again.
07:13Yeah.
07:14Yeah, I think it's an interesting play because it took, I think it took all of us actors and crew through an emotional rollercoaster, even us as, you know, creatives.
07:27So I can imagine that for the audience is going to be something as well, because, yeah, there are some lighter moments, especially in the modern days, your scenes, which I think are kind of needed to sort of balance the tragedy and obviously very touching, moving moments in the 1940s and even in your scenes.
07:47So, yeah, I think, yeah, it's probably going to stir things up for anyone watching the play, because there's a lot going on.
08:00And, well, again, don't want to spoil anything, but I think the ending, the second act is very striking.
08:07It just, it leaves, it leaves a mark, I think.
08:12Yes, for sure.
08:13The play runs for just a few days at the door, the rep's intimate studio space, fitting perhaps for a story that's as much about what isn't said as what is.
08:24It's not an easy watch.
08:25There's grief, guilt and violence.
08:27But if theatre is about putting us in someone else's shoes, then All My Pretty Ones does that with brutal clarity.
08:34It forces us to reckon with the legacies of war and what we choose to remember or forget.
08:40And it's made right here in Birmingham by a cast of emerging and established talent, telling a story most people have never heard of, but probably should have.
08:49And it's made right here in Birmingham by a cast of emerging and established talent, telling a story most people have never heard of, but it's a story most people have never heard of, but it's a story most people have never heard of, but it's a story most people have never heard of.