Gunner Inglorious now on stage

	Michael Burton

Renowned author and broadcaster Jim Henderson's first book Gunner Inglorious, published in 1945, has now been adapted for stage presentation by Hawkes Bay actor/playwright Michael Burton.

The story is a very human account of Jim's World War II experiences - 715 days training, ten days in action and a wound that landed him in an Italian military hospital for 19 months.

The 75-minute solo-performance takes the audience through the exhilaration, the anguish, the boredom, the comradeship and eventually, the triumph expressed in the original story.

Michael Burton says Second World War stories have become an important part of New Zealand's heritage, and Gunner Inglorious must be one of the best coming out of the country. "It's a classic of war literature that allows us to feel what it was really like to be there as an ordinary soldier," he says. "Live performance takes this a step further, highlighting the personal experience of the squalor, agony and futility of war, and at the same time the ability of the human spirit to find humour and heroism in the midst of so much adversity."

Returning from war in 1943 and suffering from grotesque nightmares, Jim Henderson wrote Gunner Inglorious while a patient in Wellington Hospital. It "purged the demons", he claims, and he hasn't had a bad war dream since.

Michael Burton, an actor and teacher of speech, says he wants his performance to reach out to New Zealanders everywhere, "especially to people who do not normally go to the theatre,"

New Zealanders from Kaitaia to Stewart Island will have the opportunity to see this unique one-man play when Michael Burton takes it on a tour of the country starting with a performance at Parliament on Armistice Day, 11 November 2002.