1 00:00:05,720 --> 00:00:10,960 Under the ermine, are they really like us? 2 00:00:12,240 --> 00:00:15,240 That's what we all want to know, isn't it? 3 00:00:17,680 --> 00:00:20,240 Or is the point of a monarch to be NOT like us? 4 00:00:22,760 --> 00:00:25,400 To be a living symbol of the country. 5 00:00:25,400 --> 00:00:29,880 The one who holds us together in times of trouble. 6 00:00:32,400 --> 00:00:37,360 Is the impossibility of their job that they're supposed to be both? 7 00:00:40,040 --> 00:00:46,120 To be recognisably like us but somehow grander, better. 8 00:00:51,320 --> 00:00:52,440 Loftier. 9 00:00:54,080 --> 00:00:57,080 The question of who kings and queens truly are 10 00:00:57,080 --> 00:01:00,160 obsessed the greatest dramatist of all time. 11 00:01:03,640 --> 00:01:06,240 In many of Shakespeare's greatest plays 12 00:01:06,240 --> 00:01:09,040 kings and queens stalk across the stage. 13 00:01:09,040 --> 00:01:13,400 Grandiose, bloody minded, demented, sociopathic. 14 00:01:13,400 --> 00:01:16,840 And the question Shakespeare asked of them more insistently, 15 00:01:16,840 --> 00:01:21,400 more deeply, more tragically than anyone before or since, is this - 16 00:01:21,400 --> 00:01:24,920 what happens when a human puts on the crown? 17 00:01:24,920 --> 00:01:29,080 Can they be just like us and not at all like us? 18 00:01:29,080 --> 00:01:35,080 What happens when the human animal breaks through the mask of royalty? 19 00:01:35,080 --> 00:01:39,960 They told me I was everything. 20 00:01:39,960 --> 00:01:42,000 'Tis a lie. 21 00:01:42,000 --> 00:01:47,520 Shakespeare's plays were performed right in front of Elizabeth I 22 00:01:47,520 --> 00:01:49,080 and her successor, James. 23 00:01:50,400 --> 00:01:54,600 There they sat in their finery watching stage versions of themselves 24 00:01:54,600 --> 00:01:56,920 murder their way to the throne. 25 00:01:58,840 --> 00:02:02,480 Go mad and get turned into pitiful figures. 26 00:02:04,520 --> 00:02:07,400 Shakespeare must have thrived on the thrill of it. 27 00:02:07,400 --> 00:02:13,520 Having his actor king say the unsayable in front of real live monarchs. 28 00:02:13,520 --> 00:02:16,880 He probed deeper into the royal mind 29 00:02:16,880 --> 00:02:20,200 than anyone before or since. 30 00:02:20,200 --> 00:02:24,920 Exploring the great themes of power, war and death. 31 00:02:27,000 --> 00:02:30,520 From that exploration of kingship, 32 00:02:30,520 --> 00:02:33,320 Shakespeare revealed the darkest truths - 33 00:02:33,320 --> 00:02:37,040 not just about them, but about us, too. 34 00:02:50,880 --> 00:02:52,880 By the late 1590s, 35 00:02:52,880 --> 00:02:56,720 Shakespeare was one of England's greatest playwrights. 36 00:03:02,840 --> 00:03:07,720 At his theatre, the Globe, he struck box office gold with hit after hit. 37 00:03:10,120 --> 00:03:14,440 A Midsummer Night's Dream, Romeo and Juliet. 38 00:03:14,440 --> 00:03:16,240 Henry IV. 39 00:03:17,560 --> 00:03:19,800 Thousands poured into the theatre 40 00:03:19,800 --> 00:03:24,240 to cry with Juliet and laugh with Falstaff. 41 00:03:27,200 --> 00:03:31,440 Laughing too was the ultimate drama queen, Elizabeth I. 42 00:03:32,560 --> 00:03:35,880 More than any monarch before or since, 43 00:03:35,880 --> 00:03:40,120 Elizabeth understood the power of performance. 44 00:03:40,120 --> 00:03:44,880 During her reign, protestant England faced the threat 45 00:03:44,880 --> 00:03:47,080 of Catholic invasion and rebellion. 46 00:03:47,080 --> 00:03:49,760 At a time of war, Elizabeth understood 47 00:03:49,760 --> 00:03:53,600 she had to sell the idea of monarchy to her subjects. 48 00:03:53,600 --> 00:03:59,040 She had to persuade ordinary people to fight and die for her if need be. 49 00:04:04,280 --> 00:04:07,080 Elizabeth's greatest performance 50 00:04:07,080 --> 00:04:09,840 came in the year of the Spanish Armada. 51 00:04:09,840 --> 00:04:13,520 England was threatened with invasion. 52 00:04:13,520 --> 00:04:18,880 So Elizabeth travelled to Tilbury in Essex to address her troops. 53 00:04:21,600 --> 00:04:24,840 I am come amongst you. 54 00:04:24,840 --> 00:04:28,160 Being resolved in the midst and heat of the battle 55 00:04:28,160 --> 00:04:30,360 to live and die amongst you all. 56 00:04:33,880 --> 00:04:36,880 To lay down for my god 57 00:04:36,880 --> 00:04:40,200 and for my kingdom and my people 58 00:04:40,200 --> 00:04:45,800 my honour, and my blood, even, in the dust. 59 00:04:48,560 --> 00:04:53,120 I know I have the body but of a weak and feeble woman 60 00:04:53,120 --> 00:04:56,560 but I have the heart and stomach of a king. 61 00:04:56,560 --> 00:04:58,640 And a king of England, too, 62 00:04:58,640 --> 00:05:03,080 and think foul scorn that any prince of Europe 63 00:05:03,080 --> 00:05:06,320 should dare to invade the borders of my realm. 64 00:05:10,600 --> 00:05:14,120 Elizabeth was a brilliant performer. 65 00:05:14,120 --> 00:05:18,760 She could write a script that would make the public swoon with adoration 66 00:05:18,760 --> 00:05:20,360 and cheer itself hoarse. 67 00:05:21,560 --> 00:05:25,840 But by the late 1590s, her star was fading. 68 00:05:27,160 --> 00:05:31,120 Increasingly, she shunned the limelight. 69 00:05:31,120 --> 00:05:34,640 Her eloquence was mostly a memory. 70 00:05:36,520 --> 00:05:39,640 11 years after her great Tilbury speech, 71 00:05:39,640 --> 00:05:43,360 another invasion scare highlighted Elizabeth's decline. 72 00:05:43,360 --> 00:05:47,680 'This is a public order warning...' 73 00:05:47,680 --> 00:05:54,880 In 1599, London was thrown into a panic by rumours of a new armada. 74 00:05:54,880 --> 00:05:58,560 The chronicler John Stow described a city on edge. 75 00:06:00,000 --> 00:06:05,240 "Lanterns hanged at every man's door to burn all the night. 76 00:06:05,240 --> 00:06:07,880 "Thousands of horsemen, well appointed for the wars, 77 00:06:07,880 --> 00:06:11,400 "were brought up to London." 78 00:06:14,120 --> 00:06:17,240 So where was Elizabeth when she was needed? 79 00:06:20,320 --> 00:06:21,480 Nowhere to be seen. 80 00:06:23,200 --> 00:06:24,640 Was she ill? 81 00:06:25,720 --> 00:06:27,160 Was she dead? 82 00:06:28,280 --> 00:06:31,600 No, just past it. 83 00:06:31,600 --> 00:06:37,560 Mid-60s, can't always get her act together. Too tired. 84 00:06:38,960 --> 00:06:43,320 Behind the scenes, the royal make-up artists are working overtime, 85 00:06:43,320 --> 00:06:47,920 pancaking on the chalk mask to disguise the web of wrinkles. 86 00:06:47,920 --> 00:06:52,560 Fright wigs are being set on top of a closely shaved royal skull 87 00:06:52,560 --> 00:06:55,080 with its layer of grey stubble. 88 00:06:55,080 --> 00:06:57,560 And thank goodness for the whalebone 89 00:06:57,560 --> 00:06:59,880 to give the old girl a bit of uplift 90 00:06:59,880 --> 00:07:02,720 but nothing can disguise the fact 91 00:07:02,720 --> 00:07:06,760 that this is a royal actress well past her prime. 92 00:07:06,760 --> 00:07:10,640 Her greatest performances are very much yesteryear. 93 00:07:13,120 --> 00:07:18,160 By the 1590s, Shakespeare's theatre company of the Lord Chamberlain's Men 94 00:07:18,160 --> 00:07:22,160 was performing at court several times a year. 95 00:07:22,160 --> 00:07:27,280 Shakespeare could see the aging Queen up close. 96 00:07:27,280 --> 00:07:30,800 Perhaps it was the contrast between this Elizabeth 97 00:07:30,800 --> 00:07:32,800 and the commander at Tilbury 98 00:07:32,800 --> 00:07:35,960 that inspired Shakespeare to write a play 99 00:07:35,960 --> 00:07:39,080 that was a tribute to the Elizabeth of old. 100 00:07:39,080 --> 00:07:41,720 And he took a chapter from our history, 101 00:07:41,720 --> 00:07:44,960 when an English army faced impossible odds, 102 00:07:44,960 --> 00:07:48,040 to dramatise his theme. 103 00:07:58,520 --> 00:08:00,440 With Elizabeth missing, 104 00:08:00,440 --> 00:08:05,880 Shakespeare gave the people a monarch as big and brave as the crisis demanded. 105 00:08:08,040 --> 00:08:11,360 A royal warrior, young and charismatic, 106 00:08:11,360 --> 00:08:15,320 who sounded like Elizabeth at her Tilbury best. 107 00:08:18,680 --> 00:08:22,760 We few, we happy few, 108 00:08:22,760 --> 00:08:26,200 we band of brothers. 109 00:08:26,200 --> 00:08:32,720 For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother. 110 00:08:32,720 --> 00:08:38,600 Be he ne'er so vile, this day shall gentle his condition 111 00:08:38,600 --> 00:08:41,960 and gentlemen in England now abed 112 00:08:41,960 --> 00:08:45,560 will think themselves accursed they were not here 113 00:08:45,560 --> 00:08:48,720 and hold their manhoods cheap 114 00:08:48,720 --> 00:08:55,000 whilst any speaks that fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day. 115 00:08:56,880 --> 00:08:59,320 CHEERING 116 00:09:00,560 --> 00:09:03,560 Sounds a lot like Elizabeth at Tilbury, doesn't it? 117 00:09:03,560 --> 00:09:07,440 And this echo cannot have been a coincidence. 118 00:09:07,440 --> 00:09:11,760 Was Shakespeare doffing his hat to the old trooper on the throne? 119 00:09:11,760 --> 00:09:17,080 And why does the speech still make the hairs stand up on the back of our necks? 120 00:09:17,080 --> 00:09:19,840 Well, because the king is saying, 121 00:09:19,840 --> 00:09:23,560 just like Elizabeth at Tilbury, I'm one of you. 122 00:09:23,560 --> 00:09:26,920 My lot is cast with you. Our blood will comingle. 123 00:09:26,920 --> 00:09:29,760 We're all part of one family. 124 00:09:29,760 --> 00:09:34,720 You're my brother, my kin - the battle will gentle you. 125 00:09:34,720 --> 00:09:38,480 In other words, we will all be equals. 126 00:09:40,720 --> 00:09:45,560 In Henry V, Shakespeare echoed the great theme of Elizabeth's reign. 127 00:09:45,560 --> 00:09:48,480 The link between Crown and people. 128 00:09:51,080 --> 00:09:56,800 The bond was important at any time but in time of war, it was vital. 129 00:10:01,160 --> 00:10:04,720 And that vision of the band of brothers, equality of sacrifice, 130 00:10:04,720 --> 00:10:07,960 the slobs and the stiff upper lips, 131 00:10:07,960 --> 00:10:09,560 all in it together, 132 00:10:09,560 --> 00:10:14,040 has been dusted off whenever Albion's in trouble. 133 00:10:14,040 --> 00:10:15,240 AIR RAID SIRENS 134 00:10:26,480 --> 00:10:30,320 WINSTON CHURCHILL: 'We shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be. 135 00:10:31,400 --> 00:10:33,680 'We shall fight on the beaches. 136 00:10:33,680 --> 00:10:36,000 'We shall fight on the landing grounds. 137 00:10:36,000 --> 00:10:37,920 'We shall fight in the fields 138 00:10:37,920 --> 00:10:39,840 'and in the streets. 139 00:10:39,840 --> 00:10:41,680 'We shall fight in the hills. 140 00:10:41,680 --> 00:10:43,320 'We shall never surrender.' 141 00:10:48,200 --> 00:10:50,480 Growing up in London after the war, 142 00:10:50,480 --> 00:10:53,440 there was one Shakespeare play that spoke to me 143 00:10:53,440 --> 00:10:56,720 more deeply than any of the others, 144 00:10:56,720 --> 00:10:58,560 and that was Henry V. 145 00:10:58,560 --> 00:11:02,680 It was not just the "we happy few" patriotic passion, 146 00:11:02,680 --> 00:11:07,120 it was not just the defiance of getting to victory despite being outnumbered, 147 00:11:07,120 --> 00:11:09,920 it was that Shakespeare, in Henry V, 148 00:11:09,920 --> 00:11:14,400 gives us a king who seems to be one of us, one of the people. 149 00:11:14,400 --> 00:11:17,840 What does he say in the speech before Harfleur? 150 00:11:17,840 --> 00:11:20,080 "Dear FRIENDS..." 151 00:11:20,080 --> 00:11:22,080 So I was taken to the Old Vic 152 00:11:22,080 --> 00:11:25,360 and listened spellbound to Richard Burton. 153 00:11:25,360 --> 00:11:29,760 Next morning, there I am on a chair in my mother's living room, 154 00:11:29,760 --> 00:11:33,640 her broomstick in hand, hamming it up. 155 00:11:33,640 --> 00:11:35,840 "Once more into the breach dear friends. 156 00:11:35,840 --> 00:11:41,000 "Once more, or fill the walls up with our English dead." 157 00:11:44,920 --> 00:11:48,480 The stirring patriotic anthem which Shakespeare gives us 158 00:11:48,480 --> 00:11:52,800 in Henry V is lodged so deeply in our memory 159 00:11:52,800 --> 00:11:56,440 we often forget the really remarkable thing about the play - 160 00:11:56,440 --> 00:12:01,920 the fact that in Henry V we have a true portrait of a king, 161 00:12:01,920 --> 00:12:05,160 a man full of doubts and fears. 162 00:12:05,160 --> 00:12:08,920 The climax of the play isn't the battle of Agincourt, 163 00:12:08,920 --> 00:12:12,000 but the night before Agincourt. 164 00:12:12,000 --> 00:12:15,080 The chorus sets the scene. 165 00:12:16,000 --> 00:12:21,840 "The poor condemned English, like sacrifices by their watchful fires, 166 00:12:21,840 --> 00:12:27,120 "sit patiently and inly ruminate the morning's danger." 167 00:12:27,120 --> 00:12:31,760 The king, disguised, tours the camp chatting to his troops. 168 00:12:32,760 --> 00:12:35,440 A common soldier called Michael Williams, 169 00:12:35,440 --> 00:12:38,080 not realising who he's talking to, 170 00:12:38,080 --> 00:12:42,120 questions the justness of the king's war. 171 00:12:42,120 --> 00:12:44,880 If the cause be not good... 172 00:12:46,920 --> 00:12:50,480 ..the king himself hath a heavy reckoning to make. 173 00:12:52,640 --> 00:12:59,440 When all those legs and arms and heads chopped off in battle 174 00:12:59,440 --> 00:13:03,240 shall join together at the latter day and cry all... 175 00:13:05,280 --> 00:13:07,320 ..we died in such a place. 176 00:13:08,760 --> 00:13:10,920 Some swearing, 177 00:13:10,920 --> 00:13:12,920 some crying for a surgeon. 178 00:13:14,280 --> 00:13:18,080 Some upon their wives left poor behind them. 179 00:13:18,080 --> 00:13:20,080 Some upon the debts they owe. 180 00:13:21,640 --> 00:13:25,000 Some upon their children rawly left. 181 00:13:29,080 --> 00:13:34,520 I am afeard there are few die well that die in battle. 182 00:13:37,360 --> 00:13:42,440 For how can they charitably dispose of anything 183 00:13:42,440 --> 00:13:44,480 when blood is their argument? 184 00:13:46,720 --> 00:13:51,200 Now, if these men do not die well... 185 00:13:53,880 --> 00:13:57,080 ..it will be a black matter for the king that led them to it. 186 00:14:03,800 --> 00:14:06,840 Henry is shaken by the soldier's frankness. 187 00:14:06,840 --> 00:14:10,480 He leaves them and broods on the burdens of kingship. 188 00:14:15,560 --> 00:14:17,160 Upon the king... 189 00:14:21,280 --> 00:14:28,800 ..let us our lives, our souls, our debts, 190 00:14:28,800 --> 00:14:35,680 our careful wives, our children and our sins, lay on the king. 191 00:14:39,600 --> 00:14:41,560 We must bear all. 192 00:14:44,840 --> 00:14:48,920 What do kings get in return for the burden of responsibility? 193 00:14:48,920 --> 00:14:52,120 Just empty royal ceremony. 194 00:14:53,560 --> 00:14:58,680 What infinite heart's-ease must kings neglect, 195 00:14:58,680 --> 00:15:00,760 that private men enjoy. 196 00:15:03,520 --> 00:15:07,760 And what have kings that privates have not, too... 197 00:15:11,320 --> 00:15:15,480 ..save ceremony, save general ceremony? 198 00:15:19,440 --> 00:15:23,640 And what art thou, thou idle ceremony? 199 00:15:26,440 --> 00:15:30,720 What kind of god art thou that suffer'st more of mortal griefs 200 00:15:30,720 --> 00:15:32,560 than do thy worshippers? 201 00:15:34,920 --> 00:15:38,840 What are thy rents? What are thy comings in? 202 00:15:41,880 --> 00:15:44,480 O, ceremony, show me but thy worth. 203 00:15:49,560 --> 00:15:53,400 Henry has stripped away the mask of royalty. 204 00:15:53,400 --> 00:15:56,920 Beneath it he is a frightened, vulnerable man. 205 00:15:58,760 --> 00:16:01,000 On the eve of Agincourt he prays, 206 00:16:01,000 --> 00:16:05,480 "O, god of battles, steel my soldiers' hearts. 207 00:16:05,480 --> 00:16:09,560 "Possess them not with fear, not today, O, lord. 208 00:16:09,560 --> 00:16:11,640 "O, not today." 209 00:16:12,960 --> 00:16:16,640 They're a band of brothers all right - brothers in terror. 210 00:16:23,240 --> 00:16:28,200 How did the audience react when they saw the man behind the royal mask? 211 00:16:30,760 --> 00:16:33,480 Were they troubled or were they swept along 212 00:16:33,480 --> 00:16:36,240 by Henry's victory at Agincourt? 213 00:16:40,600 --> 00:16:43,680 Bashing the French was always a winner. 214 00:16:45,480 --> 00:16:47,920 Maybe they went off to the alehouses happy. 215 00:16:51,760 --> 00:16:55,640 But in those same alehouses, recruiting officers 216 00:16:55,640 --> 00:17:00,480 were lying in wait for the drunken and unsuspecting... 217 00:17:02,440 --> 00:17:06,600 ..ready to pressgang them off to real, very deadly, wars. 218 00:17:13,040 --> 00:17:15,960 In the last 20 years of Elizabeth's reign 219 00:17:15,960 --> 00:17:19,800 100,000 Englishmen were sent to fight abroad. 220 00:17:21,240 --> 00:17:24,280 Many went to Ireland to quell a long-running rebellion. 221 00:17:26,920 --> 00:17:30,120 The English soldiers were described as miserable, 222 00:17:30,120 --> 00:17:33,200 naked and hunger-starven. 223 00:17:33,200 --> 00:17:37,560 There were some whose feet and legs rotted off for want of shoes. 224 00:17:39,720 --> 00:17:42,560 No Agincourts in the offing there, then. 225 00:17:46,840 --> 00:17:49,760 It wasn't just the bloody Irish war. 226 00:17:52,360 --> 00:17:56,600 By the 1590s, high prices and low wages produced a crime wave. 227 00:17:58,800 --> 00:18:02,520 People went to the gallows in record numbers. 228 00:18:05,000 --> 00:18:07,760 To many, the afflictions visiting England 229 00:18:07,760 --> 00:18:11,400 were the result of Elizabeth's failing powers. 230 00:18:14,040 --> 00:18:17,920 "We shall never have a merry world while the queen lyveth," 231 00:18:17,920 --> 00:18:20,760 said John Feltwell, an Essex labourer. 232 00:18:26,520 --> 00:18:30,080 The court was a nest of intrigue. 233 00:18:30,080 --> 00:18:33,000 Elizabeth had a toy-boy favourite - 234 00:18:33,000 --> 00:18:38,240 the Earl Of Essex was a handsome, dashing 34-year-old. 235 00:18:38,240 --> 00:18:41,880 Essex had been sent to Ireland to destroy the rebels. 236 00:18:41,880 --> 00:18:48,160 Instead, he negotiated a truce in defiance of the queen's orders. 237 00:18:52,440 --> 00:18:57,000 Desperate to explain his decision to Elizabeth, he sped to London. 238 00:18:59,360 --> 00:19:02,360 His timing was catastrophic. 239 00:19:03,800 --> 00:19:05,840 Elizabeth had just risen 240 00:19:05,840 --> 00:19:08,880 and the royal face was still being constructed 241 00:19:08,880 --> 00:19:12,320 when Essex burst into the Queen's bed chamber. 242 00:19:12,320 --> 00:19:15,160 It was not just a breach of protocol - 243 00:19:15,160 --> 00:19:17,560 it was tantamount to a dethronement. 244 00:19:17,560 --> 00:19:22,800 By seeing the Queen's body natural in all its aged, wizen truth, 245 00:19:22,800 --> 00:19:25,320 deprived of the make-up that turned her 246 00:19:25,320 --> 00:19:27,760 into the imperishable Virgin Queen, 247 00:19:27,760 --> 00:19:30,640 Essex had shattered the royal mystique. 248 00:19:30,640 --> 00:19:36,080 It was as though he'd torn the crown off her head with his own hands. 249 00:19:38,440 --> 00:19:40,160 Essex was arrested. 250 00:19:44,000 --> 00:19:47,280 When he was released, he was disgraced and deep in debt. 251 00:19:50,240 --> 00:19:53,040 Two years later in February 1601, 252 00:19:53,040 --> 00:19:57,480 Shakespeare's Richard II was playing at The Globe. 253 00:19:57,480 --> 00:20:02,640 If Shakespeare had given us the portrait of a strong king in Henry V, 254 00:20:02,640 --> 00:20:05,760 then in Richard II we get something quite different. 255 00:20:08,960 --> 00:20:12,200 Richard is arrogant and self obsessed, 256 00:20:12,200 --> 00:20:14,280 utterly out of touch with his people. 257 00:20:16,720 --> 00:20:20,800 His enemy is Bolingbroke, charismatic crowd pleaser. 258 00:20:23,520 --> 00:20:27,120 At the heart of the play there's an explosive question - 259 00:20:27,120 --> 00:20:30,320 is it ever justifiable to overthrow a king? 260 00:20:35,440 --> 00:20:40,400 But this was a highly unusual performance of Richard II. 261 00:20:43,160 --> 00:20:48,000 Essex's men had paid for a private showing of the play. 262 00:20:50,120 --> 00:20:53,480 They hoped it would steel their nerves and help justify 263 00:20:53,480 --> 00:20:57,760 the coup d'etat they were launching the very next day. 264 00:21:04,960 --> 00:21:09,520 At the emotional climax of the play, the king turns to Bolingbroke and says, 265 00:21:09,520 --> 00:21:13,880 "Mark me, how I will undo myself. 266 00:21:13,880 --> 00:21:17,000 "I give this heavy weight from off my head, 267 00:21:17,000 --> 00:21:20,160 "this unwieldy sceptre from out my hand, 268 00:21:20,160 --> 00:21:23,400 "the pride of kingly sway from out my heart. 269 00:21:23,400 --> 00:21:27,600 "With mine own tears I wash away my sacred balm, 270 00:21:27,600 --> 00:21:31,080 "with mine own hands I give away my crown, 271 00:21:31,080 --> 00:21:35,320 "with mine own tongue deny my sacred state, 272 00:21:35,320 --> 00:21:39,840 "with mine own breaths release all duty's oaths. 273 00:21:39,840 --> 00:21:44,960 "All pomp and majesty I do forswear." 274 00:21:44,960 --> 00:21:49,160 The scene and the speech is heartbreakingly full of pathos, 275 00:21:49,160 --> 00:21:53,640 but so excited were they by its potential message, 276 00:21:53,640 --> 00:21:57,360 it's unlikely Essex's men noticed that. 277 00:22:01,360 --> 00:22:04,400 Essex saw himself as a new Bolingbroke, 278 00:22:04,400 --> 00:22:06,760 someone who would restore the Sceptred Isle. 279 00:22:10,960 --> 00:22:16,360 Essex believed there were parallels between Richard and Elizabeth. 280 00:22:17,760 --> 00:22:21,440 Both were childless. Both were surrounded by self-interested men 281 00:22:21,440 --> 00:22:25,600 who stopped them listening to the grievances of the people. 282 00:22:28,600 --> 00:22:32,400 Essex wanted to turn Elizabeth into a puppet queen. 283 00:22:32,400 --> 00:22:35,480 He would be the real power behind the throne. 284 00:22:40,680 --> 00:22:44,200 On the 8th February 1601, 285 00:22:44,200 --> 00:22:49,880 the day after the performance of Richard II, Essex's rebellion began. 286 00:22:54,760 --> 00:22:58,640 There was a morning of pathetic skirmishing. 287 00:22:58,640 --> 00:23:01,440 The rebels were arrested. 288 00:23:01,440 --> 00:23:04,000 Essex was later beheaded. 289 00:23:06,960 --> 00:23:11,680 Shakespeare lived in an age when writing was a dangerous game. 290 00:23:13,080 --> 00:23:16,080 Christopher Marlowe was murdered. 291 00:23:16,080 --> 00:23:18,200 Thomas Kyd was tortured. 292 00:23:19,320 --> 00:23:22,800 Ben Jonson was thrown into jail. 293 00:23:22,800 --> 00:23:24,600 So what about Shakespeare? 294 00:23:25,800 --> 00:23:29,400 After the Essex rebellion, could the writer of Richard II 295 00:23:29,400 --> 00:23:33,760 be had up as an accessory to high treason? 296 00:23:33,760 --> 00:23:37,000 It is a dangerous dance. 297 00:23:37,000 --> 00:23:38,800 There's no doubt about it. 298 00:23:40,480 --> 00:23:43,080 And you had to become 299 00:23:43,080 --> 00:23:48,400 as good with antithesis and metaphor 300 00:23:48,400 --> 00:23:52,440 as Shakespeare did 301 00:23:52,440 --> 00:23:55,440 to ski along that razorblade. 302 00:23:58,280 --> 00:24:01,800 The reason Shakespeare managed to stay out of jail and 303 00:24:01,800 --> 00:24:06,520 got his plays on stage and the reason Shakespeare escaped 304 00:24:06,520 --> 00:24:12,160 the lesser role of essayist and commentator on the times 305 00:24:12,160 --> 00:24:15,600 and achieved the role of the greatest dramatist ever, 306 00:24:15,600 --> 00:24:20,480 was that he dramatised opposing positions 307 00:24:20,480 --> 00:24:24,440 in a way that it is almost impossible to nail him down. 308 00:24:30,000 --> 00:24:32,040 Richard II is a case in point. 309 00:24:34,240 --> 00:24:37,120 In the opening scenes the king is complacent, 310 00:24:37,120 --> 00:24:39,960 believing that his majesty makes him untouchable. 311 00:24:41,560 --> 00:24:46,480 After his dethronement, Richard becomes humble and self aware. 312 00:24:46,480 --> 00:24:50,920 He learns what it is to be a man as well as a monarch. 313 00:24:50,920 --> 00:24:54,000 His painful journey wrings our hearts. 314 00:25:00,480 --> 00:25:04,120 Perhaps the play and the lessons of the Essex rebellion 315 00:25:04,120 --> 00:25:05,960 preoccupied the old queen. 316 00:25:07,680 --> 00:25:12,520 Perhaps they reminded Elizabeth that she needed the loyalty of 317 00:25:12,520 --> 00:25:15,720 her subjects, especially when times were tough. 318 00:25:15,720 --> 00:25:19,240 Because nine months after the rebellion 319 00:25:19,240 --> 00:25:22,440 she finally emerged from the shadows. 320 00:25:22,440 --> 00:25:24,840 She turned on that old stage magic 321 00:25:24,840 --> 00:25:27,320 and gave her long-suffering subjects 322 00:25:27,320 --> 00:25:31,200 the swan song they had waited so long to hear. 323 00:25:32,360 --> 00:25:37,400 The great speech of beauty, intensity and emotional power 324 00:25:37,400 --> 00:25:39,000 was late in coming, 325 00:25:39,000 --> 00:25:44,760 but when it did in November 1601, delivered to a parliament hostile to 326 00:25:44,760 --> 00:25:49,800 her government, it was a masterpiece of Elizabethan stagecraft. 327 00:25:49,800 --> 00:25:52,640 The queen revelled gloriously, shamelessly, 328 00:25:52,640 --> 00:25:57,560 just as she had done at Tilbury, in saying, "I am one of you. 329 00:25:57,560 --> 00:26:02,680 "Those unscrupulous men who've committed deeds in my name, 330 00:26:02,680 --> 00:26:05,640 "I am not with them. I am with you. 331 00:26:05,640 --> 00:26:09,240 "There's only one thing that unites us. You know it. 332 00:26:09,240 --> 00:26:12,800 "One word. The jewel." 333 00:26:15,520 --> 00:26:16,960 "There is no jewel 334 00:26:16,960 --> 00:26:19,920 "be it of never so rich a price 335 00:26:19,920 --> 00:26:22,000 "which I set before this jewel. 336 00:26:23,960 --> 00:26:25,160 "I mean your love. 337 00:26:27,640 --> 00:26:30,480 "For I do esteem it more than any treasure or riches. 338 00:26:31,680 --> 00:26:34,760 "For that we know how to prize, 339 00:26:34,760 --> 00:26:38,600 "but love and thanks I count invaluable. 340 00:26:42,680 --> 00:26:47,080 "I know the title of a king is a glorious title. 341 00:26:47,080 --> 00:26:51,200 "But assure yourself that to be a king and wear a crown 342 00:26:51,200 --> 00:26:54,440 "is a thing more glorious to them that see it 343 00:26:54,440 --> 00:26:57,680 "than it is pleasant to them that bear it. 344 00:26:59,120 --> 00:27:03,200 "And though you have had, and may have, 345 00:27:03,200 --> 00:27:07,840 "many princes more mighty and wise sitting in this seat, 346 00:27:08,960 --> 00:27:12,120 "yet you never had, nor shall have, 347 00:27:12,120 --> 00:27:15,760 "any that will be more careful and loving." 348 00:27:30,840 --> 00:27:34,920 In February 1603, the Lord Chamberlain's men 349 00:27:34,920 --> 00:27:38,200 performed in front of the queen for the last time. 350 00:27:43,200 --> 00:27:47,160 A month later, Elizabeth was dead. 351 00:27:49,640 --> 00:27:53,080 Describing her funeral, the poet Thomas Dekker wrote, 352 00:27:53,080 --> 00:27:56,800 "Her hearse seemed to be an island swimming in water, 353 00:27:56,800 --> 00:28:01,040 "for round it there rained a shower of tears." 354 00:28:04,720 --> 00:28:08,200 It was as if her death reminded people of what they had lost. 355 00:28:10,040 --> 00:28:15,280 That rare thing, a queen who was first and foremost a human being. 356 00:28:16,280 --> 00:28:18,640 A monarch who had the common touch. 357 00:28:30,560 --> 00:28:35,520 That's not something that could be said of her successor, James Stewart. 358 00:28:35,520 --> 00:28:38,440 So unlike the Virgin Queen. 359 00:28:38,440 --> 00:28:42,720 One minute a swaggering drunk with an eye for pretty-boy courtiers, 360 00:28:42,720 --> 00:28:47,360 the next a pious pedant reciting scripture at sinners. 361 00:28:50,840 --> 00:28:54,880 And unlike Elizabeth, James was not especially keen 362 00:28:54,880 --> 00:28:56,840 to get downwind of his subjects. 363 00:28:59,600 --> 00:29:03,440 "He does not caress the people nor make them that good cheer 364 00:29:03,440 --> 00:29:07,200 "that the late queen did," said the Venetian ambassador. 365 00:29:07,200 --> 00:29:10,920 "This king manifests no taste for them." 366 00:29:19,680 --> 00:29:24,160 James's official entry into London was in March 1604. 367 00:29:27,240 --> 00:29:30,440 It was the most grandiose affair imaginable. 368 00:29:30,440 --> 00:29:35,920 Triumphful arches thrown up across the city. 369 00:29:35,920 --> 00:29:38,840 A lot of nose-in-the-air Latin poems 370 00:29:38,840 --> 00:29:41,200 which meant nothing to ordinary folk. 371 00:29:44,040 --> 00:29:47,280 So didn't Shakespeare, the god of the groundlings, 372 00:29:47,280 --> 00:29:51,040 feel a bit estranged from all this high culture? 373 00:29:51,040 --> 00:29:52,960 Not a bit. 374 00:29:52,960 --> 00:29:56,800 He wasn't the jobbing, inky-fingered playwright of Southwark any more. 375 00:29:58,680 --> 00:30:01,120 In the last years of the old queen's reign, 376 00:30:01,120 --> 00:30:05,680 Shakespeare had definitely arrived. He was raking it in. 377 00:30:05,680 --> 00:30:09,840 Rich enough to buy the second-largest house in Stratford 378 00:30:09,840 --> 00:30:14,920 and, tellingly, he was using his family's new coat of arms. 379 00:30:14,920 --> 00:30:18,600 Insofar as you could ever be and still stay in a theatre, 380 00:30:18,600 --> 00:30:20,800 he was a gent. 381 00:30:20,800 --> 00:30:25,000 At James's coronation he was dressed resplendently 382 00:30:25,000 --> 00:30:28,560 in four and a half yards of red cloth. 383 00:30:28,560 --> 00:30:32,600 His company, which had been grand enough as the Lord Chamberlain's men, 384 00:30:32,600 --> 00:30:36,040 was now even grander as the King's Men, 385 00:30:36,040 --> 00:30:41,960 their title authorised at record speed by the royal pen pushers. 386 00:30:41,960 --> 00:30:46,400 He was now officially THE court playwright. 387 00:30:46,400 --> 00:30:50,000 The question was, with all that financial security 388 00:30:50,000 --> 00:30:54,760 and royal recognition, would he lose his edge? 389 00:30:57,440 --> 00:31:01,840 James was a notorious big spender 390 00:31:01,840 --> 00:31:04,680 and when it came to the arts he lavished cash. 391 00:31:04,680 --> 00:31:08,960 Shakespeare was among the happy beneficiaries of James's largesse. 392 00:31:11,040 --> 00:31:16,480 Between 10 and 20 times a year, far more than under Elizabeth, 393 00:31:16,480 --> 00:31:18,520 the King's Men performed at court. 394 00:31:19,520 --> 00:31:22,560 Shakespeare was now much closer to the throne. 395 00:31:22,560 --> 00:31:27,640 He could observe James's obsessions at first hand. 396 00:31:27,640 --> 00:31:31,880 Perhaps that's what inspired Shakespeare to dig deeper 397 00:31:31,880 --> 00:31:36,600 and explore what lay in the heart and the head of a king. 398 00:31:40,000 --> 00:31:43,080 In the great tragedies written during James's reign 399 00:31:43,080 --> 00:31:48,360 Shakespeare explored the most profound issues of all. 400 00:31:48,360 --> 00:31:50,800 Madness and sanity. 401 00:31:54,440 --> 00:31:55,680 Good and evil. 402 00:31:58,160 --> 00:31:59,800 The corrupting nature of ambition. 403 00:32:01,760 --> 00:32:04,200 Revenge. 404 00:32:08,120 --> 00:32:10,720 We don't know for sure, but it seems likely 405 00:32:10,720 --> 00:32:14,360 that the first tragedy that James saw 406 00:32:14,360 --> 00:32:18,480 was performed at Hampton Court in the Christmas season of 1603. 407 00:32:20,120 --> 00:32:24,120 At 10 o'clock, after heavy drinking and feasting, 408 00:32:24,120 --> 00:32:28,400 the audience, all 600 of them, stagger in. 409 00:32:28,400 --> 00:32:32,040 On each side, against the walls there are tiered benches 410 00:32:32,040 --> 00:32:34,480 for the less important of the audience. 411 00:32:34,480 --> 00:32:36,240 The aristocrats get the floor 412 00:32:36,240 --> 00:32:40,160 and the creme de la creme have reserved boxes. 413 00:32:40,160 --> 00:32:44,240 There is a throne-like pair of seats for the king and queen. 414 00:32:44,240 --> 00:32:47,880 The audience parts to let the royal couple through. 415 00:32:47,880 --> 00:32:50,520 Much bowing and curtseying. 416 00:32:50,520 --> 00:32:53,840 We don't know exactly what plays were performed that Christmas, 417 00:32:53,840 --> 00:32:58,280 but it seems very likely that for the king and his Danish queen, 418 00:32:58,280 --> 00:33:02,080 it would have been the Danish play, Hamlet. 419 00:33:02,080 --> 00:33:06,360 Where else had they spent their honeymoon but Elsinore Castle? 420 00:33:08,800 --> 00:33:11,480 If there was any question that the royal playwright 421 00:33:11,480 --> 00:33:18,160 had lost his edge, then staging Hamlet was an emphatic response. 422 00:33:18,160 --> 00:33:21,080 Of all Shakespeare's plays about the theatre of the court 423 00:33:21,080 --> 00:33:25,640 it's the one most obsessed with false appearances - 424 00:33:25,640 --> 00:33:27,240 what's fake and what's true. 425 00:33:30,120 --> 00:33:34,200 The biggest faker of all is Hamlet's uncle, Claudius. 426 00:33:36,640 --> 00:33:38,840 Claudius acts like the rightful king. 427 00:33:38,840 --> 00:33:43,840 He acts like a devoted husband to Hamlet's mother, Gertrude. 428 00:33:47,800 --> 00:33:51,040 But Hamlet suspects Claudius of murder. 429 00:33:52,800 --> 00:33:56,680 The murder of HIS father, the king of Denmark. 430 00:34:00,840 --> 00:34:06,680 So Hamlet decides to reveal the truth with, what else? A play. 431 00:34:06,680 --> 00:34:09,080 "The play's the thing," he says, 432 00:34:09,080 --> 00:34:12,040 "Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king." 433 00:34:16,880 --> 00:34:19,480 James would have loved the melodrama. 434 00:34:20,560 --> 00:34:25,160 But as Hamlet unfolded he must have felt increasingly ill at ease. 435 00:34:25,160 --> 00:34:27,800 Because what James was watching 436 00:34:27,800 --> 00:34:32,080 was a reflection of his own life played out on stage. 437 00:34:33,920 --> 00:34:36,560 His father, Darnley, had been murdered. 438 00:34:36,560 --> 00:34:40,880 The murderer, Bothwell, had married James's mother, 439 00:34:40,880 --> 00:34:42,320 Mary Queen of Scots. 440 00:34:45,080 --> 00:34:46,680 They lived as king and queen, 441 00:34:46,680 --> 00:34:50,080 flaunting their crime like Claudius and Gertrude. 442 00:34:52,120 --> 00:34:54,520 This nightmare haunted James 443 00:34:54,520 --> 00:34:58,600 and here it was again played out right in front of him. 444 00:34:59,840 --> 00:35:01,520 At one point during the play, 445 00:35:01,520 --> 00:35:05,360 when Hamlet has the players act out the poisoning of his father, 446 00:35:05,360 --> 00:35:09,400 there are no less than three pairs of kings and queens, 447 00:35:09,400 --> 00:35:12,000 all within a few feet of each other. 448 00:35:12,000 --> 00:35:15,560 James I and Queen Anne, Gertrude and Claudius 449 00:35:15,560 --> 00:35:17,560 and the player king and queen. 450 00:35:17,560 --> 00:35:19,520 And what is being acted out 451 00:35:19,520 --> 00:35:23,720 is essentially the crime of James' own childhood. 452 00:35:23,720 --> 00:35:26,080 Now there was no reason why he necessarily 453 00:35:26,080 --> 00:35:28,120 should have taken offence of this. 454 00:35:28,120 --> 00:35:32,360 After all, he hadn't tried to take revenge for the death of his father. 455 00:35:32,360 --> 00:35:35,840 But, all the same, you have to wonder whether, 456 00:35:35,840 --> 00:35:39,320 confronted with these incredible mind games, 457 00:35:39,320 --> 00:35:41,360 his head wasn't spinning. 458 00:35:46,640 --> 00:35:52,440 Hamlet was about sorting out true kings from criminal assassins. 459 00:35:52,440 --> 00:35:55,760 So why would James have a problem with that? 460 00:35:55,760 --> 00:35:59,240 Especially at a time when king-murderers 461 00:35:59,240 --> 00:36:02,280 were lurking around every corner. 462 00:36:07,480 --> 00:36:10,400 On 4th November, 1605, 463 00:36:10,400 --> 00:36:14,640 36 barrels of gunpowder were discovered 464 00:36:14,640 --> 00:36:16,680 beneath the House of Lords. 465 00:36:16,680 --> 00:36:19,520 The plotters were Catholic militants. 466 00:36:19,520 --> 00:36:23,600 Their target was not just Parliament, but James himself. 467 00:36:26,600 --> 00:36:30,480 Shakespeare must have been particularly worried. 468 00:36:30,480 --> 00:36:34,160 His mother was from a staunch Catholic family. 469 00:36:34,160 --> 00:36:38,120 Robert Catesby, the ringleader of the Gunpowder Plot, 470 00:36:38,120 --> 00:36:40,720 was one of Shakespeare's relatives. 471 00:36:44,400 --> 00:36:47,560 In this climate of treason and paranoia, 472 00:36:47,560 --> 00:36:51,440 Shakespeare wrote something designed to appeal to James. 473 00:36:55,120 --> 00:36:58,640 A play about the anarchy engulfing a country 474 00:36:58,640 --> 00:37:00,960 after the murder of its king. 475 00:37:06,040 --> 00:37:08,120 Macbeth. 476 00:37:12,960 --> 00:37:16,600 "Each new morn, new widows howl. 477 00:37:16,600 --> 00:37:18,040 "New orphans cry. 478 00:37:18,040 --> 00:37:21,720 "New sorrows strike heaven on the face." 479 00:37:23,920 --> 00:37:27,480 WEIRD SISTERS: Fair is foul and foul is fair. 480 00:37:27,480 --> 00:37:29,400 Hover through the fog... 481 00:37:29,400 --> 00:37:31,480 James' obsession with sorcery 482 00:37:31,480 --> 00:37:34,280 inspired the very first scene of the play. 483 00:37:36,720 --> 00:37:42,000 WEIRD SISTERS: Macbeth. Fair is foul and foul is fair. 484 00:37:42,000 --> 00:37:46,080 Hover through the fog and filthy air. 485 00:37:46,080 --> 00:37:48,320 Fair is foul... 486 00:37:48,320 --> 00:37:53,600 In the early 1590s, more than 100 Scottish witches had gone on trial. 487 00:37:55,120 --> 00:37:58,440 Under torture, they confessed to casting spells 488 00:37:58,440 --> 00:38:00,680 in order to kill James. 489 00:38:00,680 --> 00:38:04,320 BIRDS SHRIEK 490 00:38:06,280 --> 00:38:09,400 When Macbeth's witches cook up a cauldron 491 00:38:09,400 --> 00:38:11,840 of wool of bat and toe of frog, 492 00:38:11,840 --> 00:38:15,680 James would have been reminded of the North Berwick witches. 493 00:38:21,000 --> 00:38:23,560 He had personally cross-examined the witches. 494 00:38:24,680 --> 00:38:28,520 After the trial, he wrote a book about sorcery - 495 00:38:28,520 --> 00:38:29,720 Daemonologie. 496 00:38:30,880 --> 00:38:35,040 He believed witches got their power through sex with the Devil. 497 00:38:37,440 --> 00:38:40,360 The connection between sex and power 498 00:38:40,360 --> 00:38:42,520 is at the heart of Shakespeare's play. 499 00:38:45,680 --> 00:38:48,640 Macbeth and his wife lust for the throne. 500 00:38:51,160 --> 00:38:55,360 The sexual rush of killing is at the heart of Macbeth. 501 00:38:55,360 --> 00:38:58,160 Macbeth does what his wife urges him to do 502 00:38:58,160 --> 00:39:01,440 because she makes it clear his manhood is at stake. 503 00:39:01,440 --> 00:39:05,400 "Art thou afeard to be the same in thine own act and valour 504 00:39:05,400 --> 00:39:08,640 "as thou art in desire?" she says. 505 00:39:08,640 --> 00:39:12,600 "Screw thy courage to the sticking place." 506 00:39:15,000 --> 00:39:20,520 Macbeth flinches at his demonic conversion, but his wife invites it. 507 00:39:22,360 --> 00:39:23,760 Come here, spirits... 508 00:39:25,240 --> 00:39:27,760 ..that tend on mortal thoughts. 509 00:39:27,760 --> 00:39:29,840 Unsex me here. 510 00:39:31,080 --> 00:39:37,480 And fill me from the crown to the toe topful of direst cruelty. 511 00:39:37,480 --> 00:39:39,000 SHE GASPS 512 00:39:41,040 --> 00:39:43,280 Make thick my blood. 513 00:39:43,280 --> 00:39:46,160 Stop up the access and passage to remorse 514 00:39:46,160 --> 00:39:50,440 That no compunctious visitings of nature shake my fell purpose. 515 00:39:50,440 --> 00:39:53,120 Nor keep peace between the effect and it. 516 00:39:55,240 --> 00:39:58,520 Come to my woman's breasts and take my milk for gall, 517 00:39:58,520 --> 00:40:00,120 You murdering ministers, 518 00:40:00,120 --> 00:40:02,000 Wherever in your sightless substances 519 00:40:02,000 --> 00:40:04,600 You wait on nature's mischief. 520 00:40:04,600 --> 00:40:09,000 Come, thick night, and pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell. 521 00:40:09,000 --> 00:40:12,120 That my keen knife see not the wound it makes, 522 00:40:12,120 --> 00:40:16,000 Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark to cry, "Hold! 523 00:40:16,000 --> 00:40:17,400 "Hold!" 524 00:40:18,920 --> 00:40:22,640 When Lady Macbeth says, "Unsex me," 525 00:40:22,640 --> 00:40:25,720 she's abandoning all the qualities of the right kind of woman - 526 00:40:25,720 --> 00:40:28,440 chastity, humility, and obedience. 527 00:40:28,440 --> 00:40:33,040 And the result is exactly what male moralists would have predicted... 528 00:40:35,080 --> 00:40:38,320 ..madness, insomnia, suicide. 529 00:40:43,200 --> 00:40:47,360 Macbeth is a very interesting case in terms of the kingship debate, 530 00:40:47,360 --> 00:40:51,280 because I think it's a completely different quality of play 531 00:40:51,280 --> 00:40:54,160 to any of the other tragedies or the histories. 532 00:40:54,160 --> 00:40:57,440 I think it's an almost unique play in terms of its... 533 00:40:57,440 --> 00:41:00,480 detailed and extremely depressing picture 534 00:41:00,480 --> 00:41:04,920 of a man who undergoes a profound crisis 535 00:41:04,920 --> 00:41:08,400 by having done something dreadful in order to obtain absolute power. 536 00:41:08,400 --> 00:41:11,640 What Shakespeare's interested in is the psychological damage. 537 00:41:11,640 --> 00:41:14,880 He takes the past and the future out of his world, out of Macbeth's world. 538 00:41:14,880 --> 00:41:17,880 So Macbeth ends up living entirely in the present. 539 00:41:17,880 --> 00:41:20,760 And the great "Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow" speech 540 00:41:20,760 --> 00:41:23,000 is about each day being exactly the same. 541 00:41:37,960 --> 00:41:42,520 Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow. 542 00:41:42,520 --> 00:41:46,960 Creeps in this petty pace from day to day 543 00:41:46,960 --> 00:41:49,800 To the last syllable of recorded time. 544 00:41:51,000 --> 00:41:55,680 And all our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death. 545 00:41:57,320 --> 00:42:00,280 Out, out, brief candle. 546 00:42:00,280 --> 00:42:02,960 Life's but a walking shadow. 547 00:42:02,960 --> 00:42:07,080 A poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage 548 00:42:07,080 --> 00:42:09,520 and then is heard no more. 549 00:42:09,520 --> 00:42:12,280 It is a tale told by an idiot - 550 00:42:12,280 --> 00:42:15,600 Full of sound and fury, 551 00:42:15,600 --> 00:42:16,840 signifying nothing. 552 00:42:21,680 --> 00:42:26,800 Macbeth explores how men turn into predatory animals 553 00:42:26,800 --> 00:42:29,480 but there's a moment when Shakespeare asks 554 00:42:29,480 --> 00:42:32,680 whether you need witches to convert to the dark side. 555 00:42:33,680 --> 00:42:37,960 Is there something about the crown itself which makes beasts of men? 556 00:42:40,240 --> 00:42:44,640 In one of the strangest scenes in the play, we meet Malcolm. 557 00:42:44,640 --> 00:42:49,120 He's the good guy who will become king once Macbeth implodes. 558 00:42:50,800 --> 00:42:56,640 Through Malcolm, Shakespeare explores the corrupting influence of kingship. 559 00:42:56,640 --> 00:42:59,560 "I'm not what I appear," Malcolm says. 560 00:42:59,560 --> 00:43:01,520 "You think Macbeth is bad. 561 00:43:01,520 --> 00:43:03,760 "Wait till you get King Malcolm." 562 00:43:05,000 --> 00:43:08,240 Were I king, I should cut off the nobles for their lands, 563 00:43:08,240 --> 00:43:10,880 Desire his jewels, this other's house 564 00:43:10,880 --> 00:43:13,920 And my more having would be as a sauce to make me hunger more 565 00:43:13,920 --> 00:43:17,160 That I should forge quarrels unjust against the good and loyal, 566 00:43:17,160 --> 00:43:18,800 Destroying them for wealth. 567 00:43:20,560 --> 00:43:25,440 In Malcolm's experience, a king is either murdered in his bed 568 00:43:25,440 --> 00:43:28,680 or is a bloody tyrant. 569 00:43:28,680 --> 00:43:29,920 That's what a king is. 570 00:43:31,800 --> 00:43:33,800 Does he really want to be that? 571 00:43:33,800 --> 00:43:36,280 Can he avoid either of those fates? 572 00:43:36,280 --> 00:43:38,920 He certainly doesn't want to be murdered in his bed. 573 00:43:38,920 --> 00:43:42,560 So I think it's partly a playing out of Malcolm's own self-doubt 574 00:43:42,560 --> 00:43:45,960 in the face of what seems to be the way of the world. 575 00:43:48,040 --> 00:43:50,480 Through the character of Malcolm, 576 00:43:50,480 --> 00:43:55,800 Shakespeare flags up how whimsical and unreliable kings can be. 577 00:43:55,800 --> 00:43:57,800 It's a dangerous thing to do, 578 00:43:57,800 --> 00:44:01,600 but Shakespeare knows how far to push his luck. 579 00:44:01,600 --> 00:44:05,320 So after his outburst, Malcolm takes it all back. 580 00:44:05,320 --> 00:44:07,760 "Only kidding. I'm a good guy after all." 581 00:44:10,360 --> 00:44:14,440 I here abjure the taints and blames I laid upon myself, 582 00:44:14,440 --> 00:44:16,440 for strangers to my nature. 583 00:44:23,800 --> 00:44:27,040 My first false speaking was this upon myself. 584 00:44:30,600 --> 00:44:34,000 What I am...truly... 585 00:44:38,280 --> 00:44:41,040 ..is thine and my poor country's to command. 586 00:44:43,880 --> 00:44:46,680 THUNDER CRACKS 587 00:44:46,680 --> 00:44:50,200 Shakespeare has ventured a shocking line of questioning 588 00:44:50,200 --> 00:44:55,440 about what the crown does to the human, and yet he gets away with it. 589 00:44:55,440 --> 00:45:00,080 But some demon compels him to keep chipping away at the royal mask. 590 00:45:02,120 --> 00:45:05,200 It's as if being so close to James, 591 00:45:05,200 --> 00:45:09,360 seeing at first hand the extravagance and pretension of his court, 592 00:45:09,360 --> 00:45:12,720 provokes Shakespeare to take ever greater risks. 593 00:45:15,560 --> 00:45:20,680 What Shakespeare is obsessed with is the tension between humanity 594 00:45:20,680 --> 00:45:24,000 and the delusions of majesty. 595 00:45:24,000 --> 00:45:27,200 And it's this issue that's at the heart 596 00:45:27,200 --> 00:45:29,600 of his greatest play about kingship - 597 00:45:29,600 --> 00:45:30,600 Lear. 598 00:45:49,880 --> 00:45:51,920 There are many shocking things in Lear. 599 00:45:51,920 --> 00:45:53,680 The eye-gouging. 600 00:45:53,680 --> 00:45:56,800 The most heartbreaking ending in all of Shakespeare. 601 00:45:56,800 --> 00:45:59,240 But performed as it was at the Stuart court, 602 00:45:59,240 --> 00:46:02,240 amidst all that heavy jewellery, the rivers of silk, 603 00:46:02,240 --> 00:46:04,120 the cascades of lace, 604 00:46:04,120 --> 00:46:08,520 nothing is more shocking than its immense moral argument. 605 00:46:08,520 --> 00:46:10,400 That a monarch has to be reduced 606 00:46:10,400 --> 00:46:13,880 to a lightning-struck, destitute, homeless person 607 00:46:13,880 --> 00:46:16,320 before he can achieve real grace 608 00:46:16,320 --> 00:46:21,000 and see the truth about himself and his place in humanity. 609 00:46:21,000 --> 00:46:24,320 And it's not enough even to uncrown yourself. 610 00:46:24,320 --> 00:46:26,480 You have to sink the lowest of the low. 611 00:46:30,120 --> 00:46:33,840 To grasp the level of Shakespeare's audacity, 612 00:46:33,840 --> 00:46:36,560 imagine a command performance in front of the Queen, 613 00:46:36,560 --> 00:46:41,480 featuring a naked, demented bag lady version of herself, 614 00:46:41,480 --> 00:46:43,520 shuffling among the homeless. 615 00:46:43,520 --> 00:46:47,160 Raving and crying and finding salvation. 616 00:46:50,560 --> 00:46:52,200 But Shakespeare is smart. 617 00:46:52,200 --> 00:46:56,320 He doesn't undermine the idea of kingship right away. 618 00:46:56,320 --> 00:46:59,360 Instead, he begins on a theme 619 00:46:59,360 --> 00:47:01,800 which would have delighted his royal master. 620 00:47:01,800 --> 00:47:03,840 Give me the map. 621 00:47:03,840 --> 00:47:05,760 There. 622 00:47:05,760 --> 00:47:11,040 James's great project was to be king of something called Great Britain. 623 00:47:11,040 --> 00:47:14,600 He believed the union of England, Scotland and Ireland 624 00:47:14,600 --> 00:47:17,640 would bring security, prosperity and peace. 625 00:47:18,680 --> 00:47:22,320 "But by dividing your kingdoms," he warned, 626 00:47:22,320 --> 00:47:26,120 "ye shall leave the seed of discord among your posterity," 627 00:47:26,120 --> 00:47:29,640 and this is exactly what Lear is about to do. 628 00:47:31,160 --> 00:47:32,680 He wants to retire, 629 00:47:32,680 --> 00:47:36,520 so he decides to parcel out his kingdom amongst his daughters. 630 00:47:38,960 --> 00:47:41,720 Know that we have divided in three our kingdom, 631 00:47:41,720 --> 00:47:44,320 And 'tis our fast intent 632 00:47:44,320 --> 00:47:48,520 To shake all cares and business from our age. 633 00:47:48,520 --> 00:47:50,560 Conferring them on younger strengths 634 00:47:50,560 --> 00:47:55,640 Whilst we, unburdened, crawl towards death. 635 00:47:56,920 --> 00:48:00,600 The story of Cinderella and the story of King Lear are the same. 636 00:48:00,600 --> 00:48:04,600 It's two nasty sisters and one nice one 637 00:48:04,600 --> 00:48:07,360 and the two nasty ones are picked over the nice one. 638 00:48:07,360 --> 00:48:11,240 It's sort of based on a fairytale fable construction. 639 00:48:11,240 --> 00:48:14,440 It does run away from him so dramatically 640 00:48:14,440 --> 00:48:16,640 and becomes both operatic, both very grand 641 00:48:16,640 --> 00:48:19,880 and also sort of painfully simple and direct. 642 00:48:21,120 --> 00:48:25,280 The daughters who flatter Lear will get the lion's share of the land. 643 00:48:26,920 --> 00:48:31,240 The youngest, Cordelia, refuses to butter up her father. 644 00:48:31,240 --> 00:48:36,600 But the elder daughters trowel on the praise shamelessly. 645 00:48:36,600 --> 00:48:40,360 Sir, I love you more than words can wield the matter. 646 00:48:40,360 --> 00:48:43,400 Dearer than eyesight, space and liberty. 647 00:48:43,400 --> 00:48:46,400 Beyond what can be valued, rich or rare. 648 00:48:46,400 --> 00:48:47,880 No less than life... 649 00:48:47,880 --> 00:48:51,720 In attacking flattery, Shakespeare was treading a dangerous line, 650 00:48:51,720 --> 00:48:56,400 for Lear's weakness was also, notoriously, James'. 651 00:48:56,400 --> 00:48:58,680 There was no praise, however fawning, 652 00:48:58,680 --> 00:49:00,920 that wouldn't go down well with the king. 653 00:49:00,920 --> 00:49:04,480 James often demanded his subjects address him 654 00:49:04,480 --> 00:49:08,760 as "Most sacred," or "Most wise." 655 00:49:08,760 --> 00:49:11,640 Beyond all manner of so much, I love you. 656 00:49:11,640 --> 00:49:14,680 And there was another striking parallel between the two kings. 657 00:49:14,680 --> 00:49:17,480 The boorishness of the royal entourage. 658 00:49:19,680 --> 00:49:24,920 James' court was a byword for licentiousness. 659 00:49:24,920 --> 00:49:29,960 During a state visit in 1606, one courtier remarked, 660 00:49:29,960 --> 00:49:34,480 "We had women and wine, too, in such plenty 661 00:49:34,480 --> 00:49:37,840 "as would have astonished each sober beholder." 662 00:49:37,840 --> 00:49:40,440 In the play, it's this kind of royal debauchery 663 00:49:40,440 --> 00:49:42,880 that is Lear's undoing. 664 00:49:45,000 --> 00:49:49,000 He wants to keep a retinue of 100 knights. 665 00:49:49,000 --> 00:49:54,040 It's like a travelling band of rowdy football supporters. 666 00:49:54,040 --> 00:49:56,560 But Lear's daughters won't allow it. 667 00:49:56,560 --> 00:50:02,400 And now he's handed over his crown, Lear is powerless to resist them. 668 00:50:02,400 --> 00:50:04,400 There is something deeply painful about a man 669 00:50:04,400 --> 00:50:06,400 who puts himself into that position. 670 00:50:06,400 --> 00:50:10,800 That ludicrous sort of position of the king without a crown. 671 00:50:10,800 --> 00:50:13,160 It's an amazing moment when you can see 672 00:50:13,160 --> 00:50:15,480 a man of huge power and huge influence 673 00:50:15,480 --> 00:50:20,040 just suddenly... his function has disappeared, 674 00:50:20,040 --> 00:50:22,080 so he disappears with it. 675 00:50:22,080 --> 00:50:26,560 And that seems to be an extension of the kingship, 676 00:50:26,560 --> 00:50:32,640 the mask cracking and one's self-worth disappearing with it. 677 00:50:32,640 --> 00:50:37,760 And I think that's a profoundly Shakespearean movement. 678 00:50:37,760 --> 00:50:39,880 Dost thou know the difference, my boy, 679 00:50:39,880 --> 00:50:44,000 between a bitter fool and a sweet one? No, lad. Teach me. 680 00:50:46,000 --> 00:50:47,680 Bling. 681 00:50:47,680 --> 00:50:50,320 # That lord that counselled thee Bling, bling 682 00:50:50,320 --> 00:50:52,800 # To give away thy land Bling, bling... # 683 00:50:52,800 --> 00:50:56,880 Only when his power has been stripped away 684 00:50:56,880 --> 00:51:01,040 can Lear begin to comprehend the human condition. 685 00:51:01,040 --> 00:51:04,760 He's on the torturing road to understanding. 686 00:51:04,760 --> 00:51:08,440 But the man who must help him on his journey is his fool. 687 00:51:08,440 --> 00:51:10,440 # Bling, bling To give away thy land 688 00:51:10,440 --> 00:51:11,760 # Bling! # 689 00:51:11,760 --> 00:51:15,120 Once again, Shakespeare dares to make comparisons 690 00:51:15,120 --> 00:51:18,560 between James' and Lear's worlds. 691 00:51:18,560 --> 00:51:22,440 James was the first monarch for a long time to have a fool. 692 00:51:22,440 --> 00:51:26,560 Archie Armstrong. His very own Billy Connolly. 693 00:51:26,560 --> 00:51:30,480 Archie was paid to be rude to the king on the understanding 694 00:51:30,480 --> 00:51:34,400 that at the end of the routine, everything returned to normal. 695 00:51:34,400 --> 00:51:39,280 King on his throne. Fool on the bottom step, jiggling his bells. 696 00:51:39,280 --> 00:51:41,120 Not in Lear. 697 00:51:41,120 --> 00:51:44,360 The fool is merciless. Piercing. 698 00:51:44,360 --> 00:51:46,600 # The sweet and bitter fool Bling, bling 699 00:51:46,600 --> 00:51:49,640 # Will presently appear Bling, bling 700 00:51:49,640 --> 00:51:53,720 # The one in motley here Bling, bling 701 00:51:53,720 --> 00:51:59,240 # The other found out there Bling, bling. # 702 00:51:59,240 --> 00:52:02,960 Dost thou call me fool, boy? 703 00:52:02,960 --> 00:52:07,280 All thy other titles thou hast given away that thou was born with. 704 00:52:07,280 --> 00:52:11,960 Like Lear, James had famously been called a fool. 705 00:52:11,960 --> 00:52:14,640 The wisest fool in Christendom. 706 00:52:14,640 --> 00:52:15,640 THUNDER CRACKS 707 00:52:15,640 --> 00:52:18,720 In brimful man! 708 00:52:18,720 --> 00:52:23,160 Stripped of his knights, powerless and homeless, 709 00:52:23,160 --> 00:52:26,960 Lear goes out into the wilderness while a storm rages. 710 00:52:28,640 --> 00:52:32,520 Shakespeare views that outside is the point where you discover things 711 00:52:32,520 --> 00:52:34,720 you didn't know and the inside is, you know, 712 00:52:34,720 --> 00:52:36,760 the safe and secure place. 713 00:52:36,760 --> 00:52:39,600 So you know, in the comedies, it's the magic forest 714 00:52:39,600 --> 00:52:45,320 and the magic island and, in the tragedies, it's the blasted heath. 715 00:52:45,320 --> 00:52:47,520 And in the comedies, you learn how to love, 716 00:52:47,520 --> 00:52:50,400 and in tragedies, you learn how to die. 717 00:52:50,400 --> 00:52:54,160 And actually that's what the tragic heroes do outside. 718 00:52:54,160 --> 00:52:56,440 They discover... They confront death. 719 00:53:10,520 --> 00:53:14,600 And there in that terrible place, literally at his wits' end, 720 00:53:14,600 --> 00:53:18,600 the destitute king wises up at last 721 00:53:18,600 --> 00:53:20,920 and does what kings are not supposed to do 722 00:53:20,920 --> 00:53:24,120 but what the Christian saviour required of them. 723 00:53:24,120 --> 00:53:27,720 That they become fully part of the human condition, 724 00:53:27,720 --> 00:53:31,400 no matter how filthy, sick, prostrate or demented. 725 00:53:31,400 --> 00:53:35,680 The homeless, childless, crazy, fallen king 726 00:53:35,680 --> 00:53:39,600 becomes just another un-accommodated man 727 00:53:39,600 --> 00:53:43,120 and into his foaming, roaring mouth, 728 00:53:43,120 --> 00:53:48,240 Shakespeare puts a terrible warning to all the mighty of the world. 729 00:53:50,080 --> 00:53:54,800 Poor, naked wretches wheresoe'r you are. 730 00:53:54,800 --> 00:53:59,560 That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm. 731 00:53:59,560 --> 00:54:04,520 How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides, 732 00:54:04,520 --> 00:54:06,760 Your loop'd and window'd raggedness 733 00:54:06,760 --> 00:54:10,360 Defend you from seasons such as these? 734 00:54:11,800 --> 00:54:14,280 O, 735 00:54:14,280 --> 00:54:17,960 I have ta'en too little care of this. 736 00:54:18,920 --> 00:54:21,800 Take physic, pomp. 737 00:54:21,800 --> 00:54:25,640 Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel 738 00:54:25,640 --> 00:54:27,880 And show the heavens more just. 739 00:54:27,880 --> 00:54:30,440 THUNDER BOOMS 740 00:54:36,600 --> 00:54:37,840 I think it is subversive 741 00:54:37,840 --> 00:54:41,880 at the most profound level of all of Shakespeare's plays. 742 00:54:41,880 --> 00:54:47,560 In that it is the play, the reason the poetry is at its barest... 743 00:54:49,200 --> 00:54:53,000 ..and simplest and most powerful in that play 744 00:54:53,000 --> 00:54:59,760 is because that is where Shakespeare is testing humanity most brutally. 745 00:55:01,600 --> 00:55:08,200 The sandblasting of experience on the individual of King Lear 746 00:55:08,200 --> 00:55:13,560 is so extreme that you really do see the skull underneath the skin. 747 00:55:17,240 --> 00:55:20,680 The profundity of Lear may have been its saving grace. 748 00:55:25,680 --> 00:55:29,240 It was a searing portrayal of kingship, 749 00:55:29,240 --> 00:55:31,040 but it was also much more than that. 750 00:55:33,880 --> 00:55:38,160 It was a play which transcended court politics 751 00:55:38,160 --> 00:55:41,200 to speak about universal truths. 752 00:55:41,200 --> 00:55:45,720 And its truth is what helped get Shakespeare off the hook. 753 00:55:47,320 --> 00:55:48,600 Got any spare change? 754 00:55:50,280 --> 00:55:56,240 By humbling a king, Shakespeare reveals our common humanity. 755 00:56:02,920 --> 00:56:06,640 The deep experiences we all share - 756 00:56:06,640 --> 00:56:11,160 love and loss and loneliness. 757 00:56:12,680 --> 00:56:14,720 The equality of suffering. 758 00:56:17,400 --> 00:56:21,720 Was James listening to Lear's message to "Take physic, pomp. 759 00:56:21,720 --> 00:56:25,040 "Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel?" 760 00:56:26,280 --> 00:56:28,440 Probably not. 761 00:56:28,440 --> 00:56:30,400 Neither he nor his son, Charles, 762 00:56:30,400 --> 00:56:33,040 had much interest in the plight of the poor. 763 00:56:36,560 --> 00:56:41,440 Why should they? In their own minds, they were gods on earth. 764 00:56:41,440 --> 00:56:46,840 James had written that monarchs were as if on a stage, 765 00:56:46,840 --> 00:56:51,880 but his stage was a platform of incomparable elevation, 766 00:56:51,880 --> 00:56:56,080 closer to the god who had anointed him than to his subjects. 767 00:56:56,080 --> 00:56:59,600 Shakespeare though, knew about both high and low. 768 00:56:59,600 --> 00:57:02,240 He had burrowed through the ant heap of London 769 00:57:02,240 --> 00:57:05,320 and he had strode through the palaces of kings. 770 00:57:05,320 --> 00:57:08,320 His stage was different. 771 00:57:08,320 --> 00:57:12,040 A place where high-born illusions could be brought down to earth, 772 00:57:12,040 --> 00:57:14,040 to the saving recognition 773 00:57:14,040 --> 00:57:18,240 that we are all made of the same human stuff. 774 00:57:19,960 --> 00:57:23,800 At the most heart-rending moment of the play, 775 00:57:23,800 --> 00:57:28,080 Lear uses this image, not preeningly but tragically, 776 00:57:28,080 --> 00:57:32,320 to comfort the blinded, wailing, old Gloucester. 777 00:57:32,320 --> 00:57:34,920 "When we are born, we cry 778 00:57:34,920 --> 00:57:40,040 "That we are come to this great stage of fools." 779 00:57:40,040 --> 00:57:44,240 That the royal lead actor, the wisest fool in Christendom, 780 00:57:44,240 --> 00:57:50,560 was permanently stage-struck by his invulnerable sense of grandeur. 781 00:57:51,680 --> 00:57:55,240 Likewise, James' son, Charles I, 782 00:57:55,240 --> 00:57:59,760 with the result that on a wintry morning in January 1649, 783 00:57:59,760 --> 00:58:03,960 some 40 years after the first performance of King Lear, 784 00:58:03,960 --> 00:58:07,040 and more than 30 years after Shakespeare's death, 785 00:58:07,040 --> 00:58:10,920 Charles I stepped onto the scaffold from this room, 786 00:58:10,920 --> 00:58:14,360 his father's banqueting house theatre. 787 00:58:15,960 --> 00:58:19,640 Lear had won wisdom by losing his mind. 788 00:58:19,640 --> 00:58:22,680 Charles would merely lose his head. 789 00:58:25,920 --> 00:58:28,560 A head which, when held up to the crowd, 790 00:58:28,560 --> 00:58:33,040 was the head of just another man. 791 00:59:00,920 --> 00:59:03,920 Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd