A NOT-SO-MAGICAL RETURN TO BROADWAY; EPIC SHAKESPEARE
Four plays, three kings, 17 bloody years of English history, seven hours onstage. The numbers bespeak the ambition of “DruidShakespeare.”
As adapted by Mark O’Rowe, “Richard II,” “Henry IV” (Parts I and II) and “Henry V” have become one epic tale of power, legacy and loss.
The Lincoln Center Festival show can be seen in one marathon or over two evenings. Each part is ardently acted and eloquently spoken. But it takes patience to experience the chapter that’s most satisfying and transporting.
Director Garry Hynes, who won a Tony in 1998 for “The Beauty Queen of Leenane,” heads Ireland’s Druid troupe and wraps her gender-blind production in atmospheric fashion. A dirt floor lends a common, earthy touch. Lighting, like monarchs’ and conspirators’ minds, is shadowy.
Marty Rea intrigues as Richard II, who he plays as flighty and ineffectual. In white makeup and gold and crimson garb, he resembles an exotic bird — a pale-faced giggler, perhaps. But his bloody head shows that he doesn’t laugh or easily surrender his crown when overthrown by Bolingbroke (Derbhle Crotty, who takes on a man’s role), who becomes Henry IV.
Both parts of “Henry IV” prove talky. But Rory Nolan impresses as Falstaff, who’ll be damned and doomed by former pal Henry IV. “Henry V,” led by actress Aisling O’Sullivan in another role usually played by a man, follows the ruler into war in France. By turns urgent, saucy and poignant, it’s the most satisfying, colorful movement of the quartet.
“DruidShakespeare” begins and ends with arresting images that make a plangent point: As egomad and empire-building kings keep busy, gravediggers do, too.