As Henry I of England starts, you are plunged into total darkness – save, that is, for the light leaking through the beautiful stained glass windows of St James’ Church, making for a striking opening to an evening of fine drama.
Henry takes us back to the twelfth century and the three and a half decades long reign from 1100 of William the Conqueror’s fourth son, crowned after he seized power following the death of his brother William Rufus in a hunting accident.
The work is by Beth Flintoff, fresh from her other recent Reading success, Oscar Wilde on Trial, staged in Reading’s prison chapel earlier this autumn.
Flintoff is a hugely talented playwright, and in Henry she turns in another outstanding script, complete with some deft touches of humour and a brilliant capturing of the rhythms of everyday speech. It brings out the human story, as well as the brutality of its age, while managing to make it relevant to the present day. Henry is a study of power whose timing, in a year of seismic political events, seems wholly appropriate.
Flintoff worked with academics from Reading University, and others, to ensure historical accuracy of the story, and this expert knowledge of the subject matter came over as well.
She gives centre stage, too, to the women of the tale, the wives, mothers, sisters and daughters, and it is their story as much as the men’s.
It’s a large cast, with a number of the roles doubling up, and they were all well directed by Hal Chambers, the scenes flitting between Normandy and England. Staging and choreography also had the precision of that arrow that fatally struck William Rufus, especially in scenes such as the hunt and the boating disaster in which Henry’s only legitimate son and heir, William Adelin, drowned.
Finally, a good understanding is given of why Henry came to found the abbey here, his spiritual reflections and ultimate desire for redemption.
Almost always intense, sometimes chilling, occasionally funny, this is a big, mesmerising play that could hardly have made a stronger contribution to the 2016 year of culture in Reading. Anyone who thought there was no high drama in the town should see Henry – and think again.
Henry I of England is running at St Jame’s Catholic Church, Abbot’s Walk until 19 November. Tickets are available online.
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