Two Falstaffian Shakespeare histories in one
PLAYER KINGS
Henry IV Parts 1 and 2, adapted by Robert Icke
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Noël Coward Theatre, London, until June 22, then touring
THERE’S A LOVELY MOMENT at the end of the first half of Player Kings, Robert Icke’s version of 1 and 2 Henry IV. Falstaff’s lifeless body is crumpled against the stage wall. A doleful countertenor sings a lament. Hal (Toheeb Jimoh) pays his respects amid the rubble of the Battle of Shrewsbury, wryly observing that “I could have better spared a better man”, and promising to “embowel” his comrade’s body for burial. The theatre safety curtain begins to lower on this mournful scene.
Suddenly Falstaff (Ian McKellen), alone on stage, jerks into outraged life: “Embowelled?” The curtain stops, then goes into reverse, reopening the stage. The play is not over, because the fat man has not yet sung. The better part of valour has been, as Sir John wheezily assures the delighted audience, discretion. Falstaff lives to tell the tale, and when we meet him again after the interval he is milking it for all it is worth, endorsing his own brand of sack and channelling military heroes such as Captain Tom with blazer, medals and a twinkle in the eye before an indulgent public.
For Shakespeare the two parts of Henry IV dramatized a struggle for the kingdom that is also a struggle for command of the stage. Different characters make intermittent bids for political and theatrical dominance: the king, scarred by civil conflict, is never quite able to command his own plays; his wayward and lonely son Hal has one early soliloquy, but can’t sustain his role; the hardened soldier Hotspur, rebel prince of the north, is a doer, not a talker.
But, despite Icke’s realist staging of war, complete with helicopters, camouflage and explosions, there is no real contest for supremacy in Player Kings. This is a Falstaff vehicle – or perhaps a McKellen vehicle. (It’s difficult to judge the extent of the production’s self-consciousness about the “national treasure” status of its star.) No one else really gets a look-in. Hal is not liberated by Falstaff, but squeezed out by him, unable to secure a convincing persona in the tavern world. Whether their companionship is familial, or erotic, or pragmatic on either side is not really explored. And when Pistol (Samuel Edward-Cook, also doubling Hotspur), bristling with a flick-knife and lines borrowed from epic drama, makes a brief claim to centre-stage, jumping histrionically onto a billiards table in the Eastcheap tavern, he is ferociously dispatched by Falstaff. No theatrical usurper can be admitted. More widely, the other characters seem content to be foils to the lead. The most common blocking on the wide stage of the Noël Coward Theatre is a surprisingly dull one: Falstaff talking from an armchair stage left, wit
