End As a Man

By T.E. Kalem

HENRY V

by WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

Such was the heroic acting style of Laurence Olivier in the film of Henry V that it has somewhat distorted an entire generation's perception of the play.

The text is rather more ambiguous.

Both Henry's character and his situation are fraught with parlous uncertainties. He has been a playboy prince who has boozed it up in the taverns with Falstaff. Does he possess the mettle for kingship? His men have divided hearts about the war in France. He must inspire them with "a little touch of Harry in the night." Before Agincourt he soliloquizes over the crushing burdens and terrible loneliness of royalty ("Upon the King! Let us our lives, our souls ... our children and our sins lay on the King! We must bear all").

Beginning the play as an erstwhile rakehell son, Henry (Paul Rudd) ends it as the lord of two realms who is planning to father an heir. The purpose of that utterly beguiling last-act courtship scene with Katherine (Meryl Streep) is, apart from statecraft, to show us that he has triumphantly undergone the arduous initiation rites of manhood.

With the heraldic pennants flying at Central Park's Delacorte Theater, Joseph Papp's production does not stint on pageantry. While the evening is workmanlike, it never truly evokes Shakespeare's "Muse of fire." Rudd's Henry seems apprenticed to his role rather than the master of it. Streep is a potent charmer as Katherine. Since I there is no admission charge, this is an enticing opportunity to follow Cole Porter's advice and "brush up your Shakespeare."

T.E. Kalem

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