An Age of Kings

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An Age of Kings
An Age of Kings.jpg
DVD Box-Set
Genre Drama, Tragedy, History
Created by Peter Dews
Developed by Eric Crozier
Written by William Shakespeare
Directed by Michael Hayes
Theme music composer Arthur Bliss
Composer(s) Chrisopher Whelen
Country of origin United Kingdom
Original language(s) English
No. of seasons 1
No. of episodes 15
Production
Producer(s) Peter Dews
Cinematography Bert Postlethwaite
Running time 947 minutes
Production company(s) BBC Television
Distributor 2 Entertain
Broadcast
Original channel BBC Television Service
Picture format 4:3
Audio format Monaural
Original run 28 April 1960 (1960-04-28) – 17 November 1960 (1960-11-17)

An Age of Kings is a series of television adaptations of the eight sequential history plays of William Shakespeare (Richard II, 1 Henry IV, 2 Henry IV, Henry V, 1 Henry VI, 2 Henry VI, 3 Henry VI and Richard III), produced by the BBC in 1960.

Contents

Introduction [edit]

The concept for the series originated in 1959 with Peter Dews, a veteran BBC producer and director, who was inspired by a 1951 Anthony Quayle directed production of the tetralogy at the Theatre Royal and a 1953 Douglas Seale directed repertory cast production of the three parts of Henry VI at the Birmingham Repertory Theatre and subsequently, The Old Vic.[1] The most conceptually ambitious Shakespeare project ever filmed, each episode cost roughly £4,000, there were 600 speaking parts, and thirty weeks of rehearsal were required prior to shooting. Adapter Eric Crozier cut the text of the eight plays into sixty and seventy-five minute episodes, which tended to roughly correspond to half of each play. The only exception to this was 1 Henry VI, which was reduced to a single hour-long episode.[2]

Dews sourced most of his cast from The Old Vic, using many of the same actors who had appeared in Seale's production, although in different roles (Paul Daneman for example, played Henry VI for Seale, but played Richard III in Age of Kings). Dews also used actors with whom he had worked whilst directing undergraduate plays at Oxford University. He gave the job of directing to his assistant, Michael Hayes.[2] The initial plan was for the series to be the inaugural production in the BBC's newly built BBC Television Centre in London, but when the studios opened, the series wasn't ready, and was instead broadcast from the Riverside Studios in Hammersmith.[2] Peter Dews described the set as "a large permanent structure; platforms, steps, corridors, pillars, and gardens, which will house nearly all the plays' action and which will, despite its outward realism, be not very far from Shakespeare's "unworthy scaffold"."[3] The entire production was shot with only four cameras, and for battle scenes a cyclorama was used, with a lot of smoke. Almost the entire series was shot in medium and close ups. All ten episodes were broadcast live,[4] and a 16mm "telerecording" was made by literally filming a television screen.[5]

Many of the episodes ended with wordless pseudo-teasers for the following episode. For example, "The Deposing of the King" ends with a shot of Northumberland's dagger stabbed into Henry IV's paperwork, visually alluding to his later rebellion. "Signs of War" ends with a shot of a signpost reading "Agincourt", alluding to the upcoming battle in the following episode. "The Sun in Splendour" ends with George, Duke of Clarence almost falling into a vat of wine, only to be saved by his brother, Richard, who looks deviously at the camera and smiles, alluding to his subsequent murder. "The Dangerous Brother" ends with Richard watching the sleeping Princes in the Tower before smiling to himself and then blowing out a candle, again alluding to his planned murder. Head of BBC drama Michael Barry referred to these "teasers" by explaining that "a strengthened purpose is added to the narrative when it is wholly seen, and we are able to look forward to 'what happens next'."[6]

The series was a huge success, with an average viewing audience of three million in the UK alone. The Times hailed the production as "monumental; a landmark in the BBC's Shakespearian tradition."[7] The series went on to win the British Guild of Directors' award for "Excellence in Directing" and the Peabody Award in the US.[8]

The episodes [edit]

"Richard II: The Hollow Crown" [edit]

  • First transmitted: 28 April 1960

"Richard II: The Deposing of a King" [edit]

  • First transmitted: 12 May 1960

"Henry IV: Rebellion from the North" [edit]

  • First transmitted: 26 May 1960

"Henry IV: The Road to Shrewsbury" [edit]

  • First transmitted: 9 June 1960

"Henry IV: The New Conspiracy" [edit]

  • First transmitted: 23 June 1960

"Henry IV: Uneasy Lies the Head" [edit]

  • First transmitted: 7 July 1960

"Henry V: Signs of War" [edit]

  • First transmitted: 21 July 1960

"Henry V: The Band of Brothers" [edit]

  • First transmitted: 4 August 1960

"Henry VI: The Red Rose and the White" [edit]

  • First transmitted: 25 August 1960

"Henry VI: The Fall of a Protector" [edit]

  • First transmitted: 8 September 1960

"Henry VI: The Rabble from Kent" [edit]

  • First transmitted: 22 September 1960

"Henry VI: The Morning's War" [edit]

  • First transmitted: 6 October 1960

"Henry VI: The Sun in Splendour" [edit]

  • First transmitted: 20 October 1960

"Richard III: The Dangerous Brother" [edit]

  • First transmitted: 3 November 1960

"Richard III: The Boar Hunt" [edit]

  • First transmitted: 17 November 1960

Footnotes [edit]

  1. ^ Patricia Lennox, "Henry VI: A Television History in Four Parts", in Thomas A. Pendleton (ed.) Henry VI: Critical Essays (London: Routledge, 2001), 237
  2. ^ a b c Al Senter, An Age of Kings: Viewing Notes (booklet included with the DVD box-set)
  3. ^ Quoted in Emma Smith, "Shakespeare Serialized: An Age of Kings", in Robert Shaughnessy (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare and Popular Culture (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 140
  4. ^ Patricia Lennox, "Henry VI: A Television History in Four Parts", in Thomas A. Pendleton (ed.) Henry VI: Critical Essays (London: Routledge, 2001), 238
  5. ^ Patricia Lennox, "Henry VI: A Television History in Four Parts", in Thomas A. Pendleton (ed.) Henry VI: Critical Essays (London: Routledge, 2001), 240
  6. ^ Quoted in Emma Smith, "Shakespeare Serialized: An Age of Kings", in Robert Shaughnessy (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare and Popular Culture (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 137
  7. ^ Quoted in Emma Smith, "Shakespeare Serialized: An Age of Kings", in Robert Shaughnessy (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare and Popular Culture (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 136
  8. ^ Patricia Lennox, "Henry VI: A Television History in Four Parts", in Thomas A. Pendleton (ed.) Henry VI: Critical Essays (London: Routledge, 2001), 239

See also [edit]

External links [edit]
Plays
Tragedies
Comedies
Histories
Shakespeare (oval-cropped).png
Poems
Apocrypha
Plays
Poetry
Miscellaneous
Characters
On screen
Richard II
Henry IV, Part 1
Henry IV, Part 2
Henry V
Related
William Shakespeare's first historical tetralogy
Characters
On screen
Related
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