The Stage

Henry V

Published Monday 1 March 2010 at 15:35 by Heather Neill

Coinciding neatly with the Six Nations rugby tournament, Emily Lim’s production offers a sporty take on Shakespeare’s account of the warrior king’s exploits across the Channel. Previously a recruiting call (as in Olivier’s forties film), an anti-war treatise or a celebration of Englishness, here it is a board game, with the audience - cast as English or French - surrounding a floor map showing France and the English Channel.

A scene from Henry V at Southwark Playhouse

The cast of seven, in shorts and sneakers, deftly change roles by swapping red (English) and blue (French) named mini-tabards. Simon Tierney as four characters, notably a spoilt-boy Dauphin, and Fiona Watson as six are especially heroic, while Anna McSweeney, a die-rolling Chorus, holds proceedings together and still manages to be a charming Catherine. Tom Greaves makes a lanky English public school team captain as Henry in Lim’s cut-down version with - in Chris Gylee’s design - skittles for armies and plastic stacking boxes for ships.

As winner of the Better Bankside Award to direct Shakespeare for schoolchildren, new graduate Lim has made bold choices. If the game idea, with combatants as pieces, risks an almost cynical distancing from human emotion, the under the arches space is used to its advantage and the story is clearly and energetically told. Lim will have plenty more to show us in future.