PETER Duncan, Edmund Wiseman and Emily Bowker head the cast of Rachel Wagstaff’s powerfully emotional stage adaptation of Sebastian Faulks’s novel Birdsong which is staged at Darlington Civic Theatre in March.

Duncan returns as Jack Firebrace, the role he played in the 2014 tour. Though perhaps best known as a Blue Peter presenter, he began his acting career in the 1970s when he joined the National Theatre.

Recent theatre credits include Denry Machin in The Card, for which he received an Olivier nomination for Best Actor in a Musical, Alan Ayckbourn‘s Things We Do For Love, Stan Laurel in Laurel and Hardy, Macduff in Macbeth and Fantastic Mr Fox, both at the Open Air Theatre in Regent’s Park.

Wiseman, whose recent theatre credits include Richard II (RSC/Barbican), Duchess of Malfi (White Bear Theatre) and Filumena (Almeida), and Emily Bowker, whose recent roles include A Bunch of Amateurs (The Watermill) and What the Women Did (Two’s Company/Southwark Playhouse), play the romantic leads of Stephen Wraysford and Isabelle Azaire.

Commemorating the First World War, Birdsong is a story of love and courage before and during the war.

In pre-war France, a young Englishman, Stephen Wraysford, embarks on a passionate and dangerous affair with the beautiful Isabelle Azaire that turns their worlds upside down.

As war breaks out, Stephen must lead his men through the carnage of the Battle of the Somme and through the sprawling tunnels that lie deep underground.

Faced with the unprecedented horror of the war, Stephen clings to the memory of Isabelle and the idyll of his former life as his world explodes around him.

The 2013 and 2014 tours were hugely successful, seen by more than 130,000 people. Birdsong runs at Darlington Civic Theatre from March 10-March 14. Tickets are priced from £17. Call the box office on 01325 486555 or visit darlingtoncivic.co.uk.