June 1st to 10th 06 - Northern Broadsides Company at Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough - Wars of The Roses (1/2) by Patrick Henry

(1/2), (2/2)

Battles depicted by semaphoric flag-wielding and huge rattling drums, vigorous balletics, sack-barrows deployed as steeds or track-turning tanks; speeches characterised by robust Northern or Midlands accents, and their inherent ironies and wiliness; intrigues concocted rapidly and sadistically, mirroring statecraft strategy related to our day now.

Such are the best qualities delivered by Northern Broadsides and there can be few complaints. Mine could be the lack of contrasts between the force of evil and the frailty of humanity within individuals of the main characters, especially the ascendant monarchs portrayed: Henry, Edward, Richard.

Such contrast would reveal the pathos and the wastage, which can move the hero, the action and the audience to the heart of tragedy. Then I remember that these are not tragedies, but designated Histories to set them apart from Hamlet, Macbeth, Othello, Lear, though the momentous clashes and potential heartbreak within them seem comparable to the nature of those other epics of doom.

Supposedly upright, civilised leaders become monstrous tyrants by the circumstances of the power arena preying upon their passionate and vulnerable emotions. One answer would seem it is not fitting for any man to have such power, yet in our own day we see that continuing: Amin, Saddam, Mugabee, Pinochet, maybe even Bush and Blair in the way they ply autocratic personality-cult styles of power within supposed Democracies and during a near-global war situation. The legendary rivalry between Yorkshire and Lancashire, or between North and South, even between England and France, emerges as just that from Shakespeare's text, and especially from this production, namely myths that set subjects apart and so divide and rule the land.

Nobility acquire titles and fiefdoms regardless of their regional origins. Jack Cade's rebellion in Kent shows oppression was not exclusive to The North. Tustles over the protectorship of France, and relations of English nobles to Joan of Arc and Margaret of Anjou, stress the fact that The Plantagenets were all as much French as English. The Rose Garden scene in HenryV1 show the arbitrariness of these allegiances: lords picking and choosing their roses on a whim at random.

The Roses Monarchs as chief characters differ from the eponymous figures of The Tragedies in the way they are bred within a jockeying for power alongside their peers and rivals, who are in the same game. and are not quite the isolated figures of Macbeth and the others, pitiable in their terrible fall. After all these considerations, I still find the relative lack of pathos and pity the one unsatisfactory item in these productions.

Exception to this is the performance of Barrie Rutter as The Duke of York, avuncular figure in the Royal House and contender to its throne during the times of Henry VI and Edward IV. When he is denounced and condemned by Queen Margaret, this scene is breathtakingly moving in the vulnerability stripped naked and the last scraps of dignity and justification clung onto until his time runs out. Rutter is the adaptor and director of this project, and the head of Northern Broadsides Company. His long and deep experience of theatre is evident and valued.

I still ask why the other actors do not give anything like the sense of grief and loss that comes from his portrayal. A question of talent, perhaps, or else a matter of direction, dispensing with some examinations of human frailty for the sake of the marvellous vigour of the productions. Kings Henry and Edward come over as weak, sly half-decent yes-men getting to the top by the accident of birth, surviving a time because they can suit everyone for so long as it works.

Continued...Next Page (2/2)

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