Has to be said, I wasn't totally convinced by Alex Hassell's Henry during the first half - he was edgier, less authoritative than I'd seen the part played before - but he showed Henry as a man who'd grown out of his wild days but was still very much a work in progress, and it worked extremely well. The other absolutely stand-out performance was from Oliver Ford Davies as the Chorus, appearing in his cardi and cords to apologise for the inadequacy of the play.
If you can get tickets, go.
Hassell is continuing the role from last year's Henry IV double, and I think Doran was very much going for a continuous arc of character development from the wastrel Hal of the Eastcheap days to the victor at Agincourt; that worked particularly well for those of us who'd seen all three.
ReplyDeleteOliver Ford Davies was terrific!