Henry IV: Doubled Up, Only Two-Thirds as Good
Seattle Shakespeare's Henry IV, as adapted by Dakin Matthews, runs Thurs. through Sun. at 7:30 p.m., plus Sunday matinees at 2 p.m., through Nov. 16. Tickets available online.
The problem with reviewing Shakespeare is that by and large, people don't care. So long as it doesn't suck (and Seattle Shakespeare's Henry IV does not suck), people are mostly going to go see it if they want to see Shakespeare, and people who don't want to go see it won't. Which leaves us speaking to a very small, marginal potential audience who could be swayed. For them, we'll let our guest's assessment stand for our own: "The first two-thirds weren't bad."
As always, the trouble is with the acting. It's not that anyone in the play is a bad actor; it's just that there's acting, and then there's Shakespearean acting. It's just one of those things that it takes many years of hard work to master, which is why you'll frequently see older actors playing younger characters' parts, and why, in this production, the stand-out was neither Tim Gouran as Prince Hal nor Ben Gonio as Henry "Hotspur" Percy, two young and talented actors, but rather David Pichette as King Henry "Bolingbroke" IV.
Describing what makes the difference is always hard, but it's akin to the effect of a skipping record finally finding its groove. Back in college, a theatre professor of ours pointed out that no matter how realistic the acting method you use is, there's always one crucial difference between art and life: the actor always knows what he (or she) will say next. The art of acting is shaping a character, of developing the character's reality to such an extent that, presto!, the words become little more than a vehicle, the road on which the actor drives, the groove in which his needle fits. The words are always the same; the only difference is how well the actor uses them. And Shakespeare's language is so much more complex and challenging that it's all that much more difficult for the actor.
Photo of Tim Gouran as Prince Hal and David Pichette as King Henry IV by John Ulman, courtesy of Seattle Shakespeare Co.
We've seen Gouran before in a different, non-Shakespeare play at Seattle Shakespeare Co., and he's good; so's Ben Gonio, who displayed remarkable talent. But neither could hold themselves in the groove the whole time, and both resorted to one of the things that's always bothered us about actors struggling with Shakespeare: They try to make up for their difficulty in giving meaning to the lines by becoming almost hyperkinetic and overly emotive. It just doesn't work. At some point, you realize you're really not following what they're saying, that you couldn't repeat the last line verbatim though you only heard seconds ago. You find yourself dazed, responding to actions rather than words (and let's face it, Shakespeare is all in the words.)
But we heard and took in every syllable of every word Pichette uttered as the snarling, embittered, disappointed, and finally mortal King Henry IV. It's one of those great lessons by way of contrast. Don't get us wrong, Gouran and Gonio aren't bad, they do a passable job, but Pichette? Marvelous, simply and truly. Steals the whole damn show, even from Richard Ziman, whose Falstaff picks up by the end of Act 1 and then struggles through a problematic Act 3.
Which leads us to the initial point about "two-thirds" of the play. Our recommendation: Feel free to leave during the second intermission, after Act 2. The only reason to stay for Act 3 would be to see Pichette's death scene (again, he was phenomenal), but it's a bit of a slog. You see, this production is unbalanced and not a true Shakespeare work. As you might recall from college, Henry IV is in two full-length parts, each at least three and a half hours in (unexpurgated) production. Seattle Shakespeare is using a script by Dakin Matthews, who cut both parts down to a single, three-act play with two intermissions and a running time of just over three hours (the play started at 7:30 and we got out at 10:45).
Now, we're not purists when it comes to Shakespeare and have no real problem with Matthews' adaptation except that it suffers from the same problem as Shakespeare's original, only magnified. Part 1 is often produced for two reasons: one, the character of Falstaff is second in the Shakespeare canon only to Hamlet, and two, it's got a great arc that lets it end in a massive, audience pleasing battle and brutal fight to the death. Part 2, though, is a complete dramatic mess. Part 1 follows the ne'er-do-well Prince Hal coming full circle from a disappointment, through rapprochement with his father, and finally the clearing of his honor by killing the rebel Henry Hotspur in single combat. Part 2 inexplicably begins with Hal on the outs again, drunk in the streets of London. Generally, it follows the character development of Falstaff and Hal, but the two only meet twice in the play, making it two separate character studies. And finally, it's a total downer for the audience.
Matthews' adaptation tries to focus on the modern interpretation of the two plays as a coming-of-age story for Hal, and so the ending of part 2, where Hal rejects Falstaff's wicked ways and becomes a responsible king after his father's death make sense to include. We see where he was going. However, Act 2 of this production (the end of Part 1 of the original plays) ends on such an exciting note that Act 3 is a boring drag. Plus, no one wants to see Falstaff get repudiated by a newly "mature" Hal. Falstaff is a coward, yes, but he also grasps the horror of war for the common man forced to fight it. Hal becomes the war-mongering King Henry V, of the Hundred Years' War fame, sort of undercutting the sense of maturity we're meant to take away. He's less a grown-up at the end than a Machiavellian ruler. So feel free to just avoid all that and leave on a high note after two good hours of theatre end with a swashbuckling bang.
