But taking the throne isn't the same as holding onto it, and as well as the chaos of the battles themselves, this is the unique period in English history when the crown passes from one man to another, then back again, then back to the second yet again.
The publicity for Owen Horsley's production has been keen to highlight that this is the Shakespeare play with by far the most battle scenes, and the projections make sure to caption each of them from St Albans to Towton and Tewkesbury. And so many heads get cut off and stuck on spikes that half the cast must have had to spend time with their faces in plaster (Alvin-Wilson's is downright eerily realistic.) It's a chaotic sequence of events, and I generally find it better with these plays not to worry too much about who all these men named after towns are and just go along with it, but all things considered the production flows well and makes sense.
In the third play named after him, Mark Quartley's Henry finally gets to say and do a bit more, although he doesn't make the best of starts - disinheriting his own son so he can hold onto power at the first sign of trouble. But for the most part, as he gets deposed and goes into hiding, he finally gets the chance to muse philosophically, in the way his duties as king always got in the way of. Most famously he witnesses the way the wars in his name have devastated a son (Aaron Sidwell) who's accidentally killed his own father, and a father (Peter Moreton) who's killed his son.
It sends Henry off on a time as a kind of hermit - there's shades of a young King Lear in the way he roams the countryside setting the world to rights in his own head, eventually running off naked (rear view, although if you're in the very high or very low seat numbers you'd probably see something worth scrolling about.) And in this instalment this strikes me as the running theme of Horsley's productions, following the way these wars tip characters who are already a bit unhinged into full-on madness; the trouble is these people get to run the country.
So after the losses of the previous play left her teetering, Minnie Gale's Queen Margaret begins the play cheerfully chucking Jack Cade's decapitated head around (she'd previously kept a rotting head as a fun keepsake so she's used to them.) Her formidable side really comes to the fore in this play, to the point that it's openly acknowledged that she's the actual military leader of her husband's forces. But as her losses increase she can't keep this up, and by the end we start to see the spectral figure who'll haunt the final play in the sequence.
And if anyone ever had any doubt that the sequence the RSC is presenting is the actual intended trilogy, the fact that the final 15 minutes essentially work as a trailer for Richard III should address that pretty definitively. Like Gale, Hughes will be returning for that this summer, and that's another interesting development. I usually see Richard as the Yorks' black sheep whose sociopathic tendencies his family indulges because it serves their agenda, but who end up getting punished for it when he runs out of anyone to kill except for his own relatives.
There's a slightly different take on this development here (whether it's more or less sympathetic is probably a matter of opinion.) York praises Richard, making him his favourite for his bloodthirsty ways. But when his father dies before he can take the crown, Edward relegates Richard back to the role of funny little disabled man, giving him the Dukedom of Gloucester despite his superstitious dislike of the title. Here there's a marked turn in Richard at this point, who hatches his plan to dispose of the rest of his family once the crown's in his own sight. By the end Hughes is a classic, villainously likeable Richard, including the audience in his confidence, even making the odd ironic nod to some of the more offensively physically grotesque performances able-bodied actors have given the role in the past. With a change of director for the final instalment this summer, it'll be interesting to see how well the through-line of Hughes' character development works.
Shakespeare's version of the story is more sympathetic to the Lancastrians (for much the same reason Elizabeth I's grandfather has a cameo so Henry can tell him that he and all his heirs are going to be just awesome, namely that Shakespeare enjoyed not getting executed for treason.) And this arrogance on Edward's part becomes the reason he struggles to hold the throne against as uninterested a rival as Henry: He disrespects his allies, so when he unthinkingly humiliates Warwick he loses his kingmaker and, for a while, his kingship. (He also loses George of Clarence, but since swapping sides is George of Clarence's main/only personality trait I'm not sure if that's significant.)
The production, which like the first one plays with two intervals, a 20-minute one then a 10-minute one, makes for a comparatively brisk-seeming 3+ hours of bloody and convoluted history. As always I'm struck by how obvious it is that this is how they should be presented, and how a fluke in the way someone chose to name them in the Folio is part of why we rarely get to see this play contextualise the more popular final one. As it stands, it leaves me ready for the grim and (hopefully) grand finale this summer.
Wars of the Roses by William Shakespeare is booking in repertory until the 4th of June at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon.
Running time: 3 hours 15 minutes including two intervals.
Photo credit: Ellie Kurttz.
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