Word: falstaffs
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...right, I give up! I love Shakespeare, but can't place a few of the cover characters. Who is the one beside Falstaff ? And the two beside Antony and Cleopatra-might they be sweet, gentle Kate and her husband from The Taming of the Shrew...
...parts of Henry IV thus concern themselves with the failure of one king, and the development of another. In these productions, the excellence of Fritz Weaver as Henry and Edwin Sherin's more than competent Prince Hall combine with Eric Berry's somewhat unsatisfactory Falstaff to show the plays in this light despite the missing context of the two other plays...
...minor errors and one major failure mar Eric Berry's Falstaff: The small things are almost petty, but they make a difference. To cite one only, Berry has been made up with eyebrows that appear perpetually raised and slightly turned up at the outside ends. Thus he looks always surprised and quizzical. Surely, Falstaff is at heart not a questioner: he cares not for the future, lives entirely in the present (Hal's first words to him are "What a devil hast thou to do with the time of the day?") and accepts that present without surprise or query...
More important, Berry stays too much at the surface of the role. In the case of Falstaff, surface bulks large, and Berry satisfactorily pads himself out and gives us the lovable fat knight. But he does not attempt the more difficult task of showing us Falstaff in all his unlovely reality--he is, after all, a coward, a thief, an abuser of the right of conscription--and after making us realize all this, bringing out the spirit that still makes him "sweet Jack Falstaff, kind Jack Falstaff, true Jack Falstaff, valiant Jack Falstaff...
...assorted lords and ladies are competently rendered, although only Elliott Sullivan's North-umberland and Pirie MacDonald's Douglas merit note. The latter is as Scots as an Edinburgh scone and a delight to hear. Falstaff's company remain in the memory longer than the nobility do--a slatternly Mistress Quickly (Alice Drummond), a frowsy and frazzled Doll Tearsheet (Patricia Falkenhain), a red faced, guileless Bardolph (Dana Elcar...