Chimes at Midnight and the BBC 1979 productions of the Henry IV plays

Before commenting on these productions, let’s talk a bit about the plays. 

I love Henry IV, Part 1. I also love Henry IV, Part 2. It seems that many people only like, or much prefer, Part 1—an exciting play, full of banter and witty exchanges between Hal and Falstaff—whereas nothing seems to happen for a large part of Part 2. It is a play of disease and decay and death. The jokes are stale. The jester is jaded. But I love them both, and love the Henry IV plays as one unified thing, inseparable. In Part 1, Shakespeare depicts the friendship, the bond between Hal and Falstaff. In Part 2, he depicts each one alone, their wit unmatched and unappreciated by other companions, and builds it all up for Hal’s reconciliation with his father and banishment of Falstaff at the end of the play.

From the tetralogy, we can separate Richard II or even Henry V, but the Henry IV plays must go together.

At the heart of the Henry IV plays is the Henry IV-Hal-Falstaff triangle. Chimes at Midnight is a Falstaff film. Orson Welles uses material from the Henry IV plays (about 5 hours), with some bits from Richard II, The Merry Wives of Windsor, and Henry V; moves things around, changes the order of some scenes, gives some character’s lines to another; and creates a 2-hour film focusing on Falstaff. Perhaps I may have liked it if I hadn’t known the plays, but I know them. Chimes at Midnight is essentially an Orson Welles film with lots of supporting actors. The BBC’s Henry IV productions from 1979 have all the characters fully developed and well-acted. I especially love David Gwillim as Hal, Anthony Quayle as Falstaff, Tim Pigott-Smith as Hotspur, and Jon Finch as Henry IV. 

The only case in which I prefer a performance in Chimes at Midnight is Michael Aldridge as Pistol. 

I also think that Keith Baxter and Orson Welles don’t have chemistry as I see between David Gwillim and Anthony Quayle, and Keith Baxter isn’t very good as Hal (though to be fair, he doesn’t have much to work with).

More importantly, the greatest flaw of Chimes at Midnight is that Orson Welles sentimentalises Falstaff, removing much of his nasty side and turning him into a harmless fun-loving old man. Falstaff is one of Shakespeare’s greatest creations: he is full of life and warmth and charisma, with lovable qualities, but he’s also a robber, a braggart, an alcoholic, a coward, a man of no principles. The greatest challenge of staging or adapting the Henry IV plays is conveying that Hal’s banishment is necessary and inevitable, but at the same time showing why Hal is so fond of him and how much it costs Hal to reject him. It’s a delicate balancing act. I do think the 1979 productions succeed at it, largely thanks to Anthony Quayle and David Gwillim. 

David Gwillim is brilliant in the scenes with Anthony Quayle, Hal and Falstaff exchanging insults and witticisms at lightning speed. He is also brilliant in the scenes with other characters, showing Hal’s ability to adapt to different environments, to adopt the lingo of different interlocutors, to transform. 

I especially love the banishment scene. I watched Chimes at Midnight first and thought the banishment scene was perfect—the best part of the film—the look on Orson Welles’s face was haunting. But the scene in the BBC Henry IV, Part 2 is even better: the look of pain and shock on Anthony Quayle’s face is heartbreaking, as Hal says “I know thee not, old man”, you can understand why Falstaff would later die of grief and heartbreak, yet at the same time you can see on David Gwillim’s face that he’s killing a part of himself as he banishes Falstaff. 

Wonderful, wonderful productions.

It baffles me that the BBC Television Shakespeare from the 70s-80s is not widely available to the public. Is this not Shakespeare’s country? 

A darker note: I increasingly feel at odds with modern culture. I’m indifferent to contemporary music, contemporary literature, contemporary art, most contemporary cinema. My interest in Shakespeare feels like a niche. And when people now stage or adapt Shakespeare, they either fuck with the plays and impose some trendy ideologies, to be “inclusive” and “subversive”, or butcher the plays, removing vast chunks of text, to be “more accessible” to “modern audiences”. 

I’m afraid that the kind of things I love will no longer be produced, and the things I love from the past will one day be lost.