Sergeant Plantagenet

By T. E. K.

HENRY V

by WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

In the delightful last scene of Henry V, Henry Plantagenet asks for the hand of Katherine of France, speaking partly in fractured French while she answers in broken English. In amused frustration Henry says: "I" faith, Kate, my wooing is fit for thy understanding. I am glad thou canst speak no better English, for, if thou couldst, thou wouldst find me such a plain king that thou wouldst think I had sold my farm to buy my crown."

In Alan Howard's rendering of the title role in the Royal Shakespeare Company production at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, the line rings disconcertingly true. It is as if the soldier-king had left the plow for the fields of combat without ever having seen his own court.

This Henry is a platoon sergeant rather than lord of the realm. It is not only his gawky stance that denies the cleverness and kingliness of Henry V's character, but also his brusquely rushed vocal delivery that seems to mimic Richard Burton's voice without offering any of its sumptuously resonant timbre.

It is not that Howard, a fine actor, is doing a bad job. He is simply responding to Director Terry Hands' imposed conception of the play. Hands clearly wants to get entirely away from any thing overtly heroic or proudly patriotic. Such an aim, however, is difficult to square with the text and tenor of the play. Once one accepts the limitations of the director's concept, there is nothing to fault in the brio of the cast, the racehorse pace or the sense of battle-weary valor conveyed. There are different ways of showing British pluck. Dunkirk is not Agincourt.

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