HENRY V: ENGLAND’S PUTIN?

A new performance of Shakespeare’s most quotable history play feels pretty tone-deaf when there’s a real-life warmonger on the loose

Tonight I took the train into London to see Shakespeare’s Henry V in the West End. The walk to the Donmar Warehouse theatre took me through Trafalgar Square - which isn’t a detail I’d normally bore you with, except that this evening the square had been partly taken over by demonstrators waving Ukrainian flags. They were protesting the Russian invasion of that country. A huge banner warned that ‘when the last Ukrainian soldier falls, Putin will come for you.’ But the guy with the mic seemed sure that wouldn’t happen. He was shouting that victory was coming for the good guys.

After that, two and a half hours of Henry V was hard going. This was not the fault of the talented cast, let by Kit Harington (from Game of Thrones). It was a little bit the fault of the director, quite a lot the fault of circumstances, and overwhelmingly the fault of the play. Henry V is one of the most quotable - and quoted - of Shakespeare’s history plays. But when it comes down to it, it’s not actually very good.

But let me come back to that.