BBC Shakespeare Histories

Shakespeare is rightly considered the world's greatest playwright for the soaring beauty of his language, for his profound insight into human nature, for truths he dramatized and for the realism of the characters he created. He was, and remains, a superb entertainer.

Featuring some of Btitain's most distinguished theatrical talent: Derek Jacobi, Sir John Gielgud, Charles Gray, Jon Finch, Martin Shaw, David Gwillim and Anthony Quayle, and many more. DVD brings out the rich beauty in the acting and sound. The English language subtitles allow viewers to correctly understand the rapid fire of the beautiful langage of William Shakespeare.

Contains 5 plays on 5 DVD's: Henry V, Richard II, Richard III, Henry IV, Part I and Henry IV, Part II

High caliber

This set of plays is well worth the price. Top notch actors make Shakespeare accessible and ever more fascinating in this set. Particularly nice is the continuity of characters/actors in the second tetralogy (Richard II, Henry IV part one, Henry IV part two, and Henry V). The actor playing Falstaff is fantastic! He alone is worth buying the set. I will say, however, that the BBC shied away from producing Henry V in its entirety, and therefore -- as usual with the production of this play -- made the play more patriotic than Shakespeare's in-tact play. If that were not the norm, it might be worth taking away half a star from the overall review.

Overall, well worth watching! And also a gem to show students! May 8, 2008

Shakespeare no-show

I know the quality of this set is very good. However, it was ordered before Xmas and STILL hasn't arrived (today is 1/14/08). I still want it--it was supposed to be my son's big gift. January 14, 2008

Great gift

This turned out to be a great gift for the Shakespeare Histories lover in the family. I like the comedies and, after her rave reviews of the histories, am thinking about purchasing the Shakespeare Comedies set for myself. The plastic was a little ripped when it arrived, but otherwise it looked great and arrived in plenty of time for the holidays. December 26, 2007

Jacobi as King -- Long Live the Queen!

I bought this set to see Richard II for the first time in almost 30 years. I am a great fan of Derek Jacobi from "I, Claudius" to "Cadfael" and beyond, and his Hamlet is the best I have ever seen.

The history plays, for this 21st century American, simply aren't as compelling as the major tragedies. Anthony Quayle makes a fine Falstaff in Henrys 1 & 2, and I haven't watched Richard III yet, suspecting that Olivier's film cannot be surpassed.

Jacobi is at his bardic best as Richard II, but he is not a likable character. He is actually quite annoying -- a prissy poppinjay and fey fop. When he died, I cried, "The King is dead, long live the Queen!" Not that there's anything wrong with being a queenly king, of course. September 24, 2007

An uneven effort, but largely a worthy one

First of all, probably the rating I would give the set as a whole is closer to three and a half stars, but as the Amazon system doesn't allow for it, four it is.

Now, then. The word that springs to mind most readily in trying to describe this set is "inconsistent." There are some parts of it that are thoroughly brilliant, and others that had me cringing in embarrassment for all involved (mostly in Henry V), although I will admit that some of the parts I thought weaker might be more palatable to someone less madly in love with the second tetralogy than I am!

To break it down a bit, and hopefully not too wordily:

Richard II is the strongest of the set by far, thanks to a bravura performance from Derek Jacobi in the title role; he's equally convincing both as callous upper-class twit in the first acts of the play and as self-styled, even self-concious, royal martyr (but no less poignant for the self-styling) being painfully awakened to his own humanity. The supporting cast is pretty consistently strong, too: John Gielgud's performance as Gaunt has become definitive for me (his delivery of "This England" is positively spine-tingling), Jon Finch is an impressively calculating Bolingbroke, and Charles Gray does good work as the conflicted Duke of York (as does Wendy Hiller, in a rare Shakespearean appearance, as his extremely proactive duchess).

The two Henry IV plays are rather more uneven, with part two, perhaps surprisingly, being stronger than part one; perhaps the fact that 2H4 is a play of decline and decay means that it's easier to do in the BBC's limited format than the more energetic 1H4. This (along with a rather unimpressive supporting cast) also might explain why, in the first part especially, the tavern scenes, which should be so terrifically lively, are actually the weaker half of the play. Most of the central performances are fairly strong, particularly Anthony Quayle's Falstaff, who is of course very funny but also gets a lot of mileage out of the anxious and wistful undertones in the dialogue -- his relationship with Hal is ultimately an untenable one, and some part of him seems to be in denial about that. Jon Finch also does good work as King Henry: witnessing his downward spiral over the course of three plays, from dynamic young usurper to burnt-out and leprous wreck, is remarkably poignant. And in the first half, Tim Piggot-Smith is a terrific Hotspur, offering a more thoughtful reading of the role than many actors give. I'm less impressed with David Gwillim's Prince Hal, though, which weakens the production considerably given that Hal, really, is the pivotal role in the sequence. Gwillim acquits himself well enough in some scenes -- particularly in the two confrontations (one in each part) between King Henry and Prince Hal -- but on the whole, his performance is fairly bland and disappointing.

This blandness goes from a defect to a cripping blow once the series gets to Henry V, because Gwillim just doesn't have the necessary charisma in the title role, and as a result the play is positively leaden. I didn't find him remotely believable as someone who could lead men into battle and inspire them to potentially go to their deaths in his service -- I'm not sure I'd follow this Henry V to the pub. Unless it was a really good one. And he was buying. Anyway, Gwillim's insipid production, combined with the uninspired effort at cinematic realism when there weren't really the resources for it, made the production largely unwatchable. There are some respectable efforts from the supporting cast (especially Alec McCowen as Chorus and Julian Glover as the Constable of France) but Henry so dominates the play that nobody else can go very far towards salvaging it.

Going from the second tetralogy to the first, the last play included is Richard III. Even out of context, I think it's the second-best of the set. Ron Cook's performance in the title role is probably television-sized rather than the larger-than-life deal needed to make a stage production succeed, but it does work well enough for the format, and the supporting cast is almost uniformly excellent (especially Michael Byrne's Buckingham, Julia Foster's Margaret, and Annette Crosbie's Duchess of York). Also, the decision to eschew realism in favor of a more expressionist design is a very good one: it looks more like you're watching a filmed stage production, but that allows you to concentrate more easily on the performances rather than occasionally being thrown out of the play by ill-founded efforts at realistic settings that weren't at all, and it feels much less like the play is being compressed into a small box (in an almost literal sense).

On the whole, the set is worth watching, particularly if you're an aficionado of the history plays anyway (and, really, more people ought to be). It's inconsistent, yes, but also has some excellent moments. I do hope they release a second volume with the Henry VIs, King John, and Henry VIII; I've wanted to see the HVIs in particular for years.
January 23, 2005

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