The gardens of Trinity College are gearing up to give their best impersonation of the fields of France this summer, when the Oxford Theatre Guild stage the battle of Agincourt for their 2009 production of Shakespeare’s Henry V.
For a play whose first line openly bewails the impossibility of presenting famous skirmishes within the confines of a theatre, we asked Stage Manager, Ida Persson, how the OTG plan to tackle such spectacles as the charge of the French forces (made famous by Sir Laurence Olivier’s 1944 film), and the answering hail of arrows from the British bowmen.
“Well, we have a few ideas,” she says, grinning mysteriously, “but nothing definite yet. There are of course, Health and Safety issues to consider, but we’ve got it covered…”
Ida is no stranger to Stage Management, having trained in her native Sweden before landing up as a Conference Manager in Oxford. A career move she felt made sense, there being “very little difference between stage management and event management”.
She has her work cut out. Written in 1599 about events that took place 184 years before, the mediaeval look of the play will be faithfully reconstructed throughout with many cast members having two versions of each costume; one clean for before the battle, and one “bloodied” for after, whilst others are doubling roles necessitating several different costumes - and even the occasional change of sex. That said, Alistair Nunn, who will be playing the King, has so far resisted attempts to persuade him to adopt the famous “Hank Five” pudding bowl haircut.
The play was written during the Nine Years War between England and Ireland under the reign of the Warrior Queen herself, Elizabeth I, possibly to bolster English resolve, and thus has often been subject to accusations of “jingoism” and the glorification of War. Ida is well aware of this.
“Our Director (Joanna Matthews) feels very strongly that there is another message within Henry V that asks ‘what are the consequences of war?’, and seeks to point out the hardship it inflicts on the ordinary people forced to take part in a situation over which they have no control. One of the more comic characters, Pistol, has a particularly poignant speech on the subject, in fact, which is almost an inversion of the famous speech that Harry gives to the troops just before the battle.”
For those who do not know the play or the speech in question, here is a snippet: “- and gentlemen in England now abed shall think themselves accursed they were not here…”
Without a doubt, we reckon the same will apply to anyone who does not make it to the show this year...!
Emma Blake is a freelance writer based in Oxford and has written for the UK music press, and for the English press in Spain. Read her blog.
Henry V By William Shakespeare
Trinity College Gardens
Parks Road, Oxford
14 – 25 July 2009
Evenings at 7.30pm (not Sunday)
Tickets: £14, £10 (OAP, Unwaged, Students), £7 (under 16s), (Matinee: £11, £8, £5)
Tickets Available from Tickets Oxford phone 01865 305305, http://www.ticketsoxford.com, and in person from Oxford Playhouse, Beaumont Street
http://www.oxfordtheatreguild.com