The King: A Review/Rant in Tweets

On November 2nd I sat down, via Skype, with my pocket dramaturg Kate Pitt to watch Netflix’s The King together. Having been forewarned, we sat down with alcohol.

Let’s clear this up right now: The only thing fundamentally wrong with The King is that it claims to be an adaptation of Shakespeare’s Henry IV parts 1 & 2 and Henry V. This is its original sin, albeit one only obvious to people familiar with the plays. Had the creators envisioned The King as an independent mud-and-blood period piece, covering the same historical events as Shakespeare’s plays but not explicitly based on them, I probably would have enjoyed it. However, by yoking their piece to Shakespeare, The King’s creators effectively shot themselves in the foot with a longbow (if that’s even physically possibly) by inviting viewers to constantly compare it with the source material.

Things were not helped by scriptwriter and Falstaff actor Joel Edgerton’s comments on Shakespeare:

“We’ve written ‘Henry IV’ and ‘Henry V’ as a period film, but with our own dialogue. For lack of a better word, [it’s] ‘Game Of Thrones’ meets Shakespeare only in that, you can watch ‘Game Of Thrones’ and understand what’s going on. I feel like, with complete deference to Shakespeare, there is something that happens when even the most intelligent people watch Shakespeare. They feel stupid, because he does the kind of roundabout version of telling you simple things. So, we just wanted to let the audience understand exactly what’s going on, and not just some people, but everybody,” he explained. (Source: Indiewire.com)

I’m not going to dwell on this too much, but the idea that “even the most intelligent people” can’t understand Shakespeare’s language is infuriating on many, many levels. Yes, Shakespeare can be totally unintelligible, but that is almost entirely the fault of the method of delivery, rather than the raw material. Do you have to try a bit harder to understand Shakespeare than “regular” English? Yes, unquestionably. But that doesn’t make it NOT WORTH TRYING.

So, to sum up: I’m all in favor of making Shakespeare accessible to new audiences who otherwise would not be exposed to his works. That’s why I’m drawing this comic, after all. However, if you’re going to do that, you have to at least vaguely respect the source material. Otherwise you’re just making a rod for your own back. I’ll address the main rod The King made for itself later on, but for now, and for your entertainment, here is how Kate and I processed our experience on Twitter.

By “the cool, fun stuff”, I was referring specifically, at the point, to the entire plot of 1 & 2 Henry IV. First of all, let’s talk about my boy Hotspur. In 1 & 2 Henry IV Hotspur is Hal’s main antagonist, an entertainingly hot-headed warrior who only cares about death and glory and wants everything to happen NOW. He is held up as the flower of knighthood, and his eventual death at Hal’s hands is a major step in Hal’s redemption arc and evolution into the king he will eventually become.

In The King, Hotspur briefly lips off to Henry IV before getting killed unceremoniously by Hal in single combat before the battle of Shrewsbury. His character is barely established and his death at Hal’s hands does not result in Hal regaining some of his father’s respect, as in the play, but rather is seen as robbing his younger brother Thomas of the chance of winning a pitched battle.

Why even bother?

Next, let’s talk about Falstaff. I don’t much care for Falstaff, to be honest, but he plays an important role in 1 & 2 Henry IV. He is the riotous vice figure who has seduced Hal away from his princely responsibilities, and a warm and vivacious rival father figure set up against the cold and reproving Henry IV. His eventual gut-wrenching banishment by Hal is the final step in Hal’s evolution from aimless young man into steely, calculating monarch.

In The King, Falstaff is a war-weary veteran soldier who tries to get Hal to see his ailing father and accepting his princely responsibilities. SO. THE COMPLETE OPPOSITE, BASICALLY. And it gets worse. That climactic rejection of Falstaff at the end of 2 Henry IV? It never happens! Falstaff just hangs around, being morose and morally upright.

Again… why even bother? Why bother lifting the character of Falstaff from the plays if the only thing you are going to retain about him is his name? Why not just jettison the pretense of being in any way connected to the Shakespeare plays and create an original, not-Falstaff character?

The Falstaff problem became even more prominent later on, as you will see. But first…

The answer appeared to be “why not?”

Kate and I will NEVER agree on the Salic Law speech, and that’s OK! People are allowed to like different things! In this case she’s wrong, but that’s OK! People are allowed to be totally wrong sometimes!

This is the million dollar question as far as I’m concerned. I’ve heard, anecdotally and in person from people not familiar with the Henry IV and Henry V plays, that The King is, actually, quite enjoyable. I’m not going to dispute that. I’m just completely unable to set aside my familiarity with the plays and view The King through a neutral, non-biased lens.

This was a little harsh. The visuals were, in fact, very pretty, and the acting was, allowing for the truly crushing limitations of the script, more than acceptable. But now… now for the Turn. Now for the moment when any goodwill I might have been harboring towards this film evaporated. Are you prepared?

Let’s just put this in perspective. Making Falstaff, the drunken, lazy coward who describes his foot soldiers as “food for powder”, who pretends to be dead in order to avoid fight, and who desecrates a corpse in order to falsely claim battlefield honors, suddenly the tried and tested veteran warrior whose input King Henry values so much that he asks him come to France as a military adviser… this is akin to someone remaking the Star Wars movies but rewriting them so Darth Vader is Luke’s loving and ever-present father who teams up with his son to bring down the Evil Empire. It’s fundamentally NOT what the character is and flagrantly disrespects the source material. Give him a different name or something, fine, but do NOT call him Falstaff or pretend that he is in any way related to Shakespeare’s Falstaff.

Anyways. Moving on…

Robert Pattinson’s Dauphin (a) had a ridiculous “Monty Python French Knight” accent, and (b) clearly decided the only way he’d make it out of this movie alive was to chew the scenery to shreds. He was comparatively delightful.

Meanwhile, Falstaff has lectured King Henry on the horrors of war and how you shouldn’t kill your prisoners even if its strategically the right decision.

To make matters worse, Falstaff then proceeds to single-handedly come up with the entire battle strategy for the English army at Agincourt.

It’s not just me who thinks this is stupid, right? RIGHT???

The St. Crispin’s Day speech, for those of you curious, turned into Timothée Chalamet’s Henry having a dig at Shakespeare by starting with “You expect of me a speech"?” before screaming “MAKE IT ENGLAND” over and over again for a couple of minutes.

So, the characterization of Catherine (here spelled with a C) was clearly an attempt to address the admittedly overwhelming dominance of men in both Western history in general and Shakespeare’s history plays in particular. To compensate, this Catherine was smart, savvy, competently bilingual, political astute, progressive, and totally in control.

Which… great, but also way too little too late.

Just for the record, Kate and I agreed that the Ethan Hawke Cymbeline was, actually, worse.

Now, before I am accused of being a Shakespeare snob, let me just say that I am open to the possibility that The King is a great, entertaining film. Indeed, I’ve come across a lot of positive responses to it, including from people whose opinions I respect and value. I’m definitely not saying the film is trash.

What I am saying is, as a piece of drama explicitly set up in direct comparison with and opposition to Shakespeare’s plays…. the film is trash and I kind of hated it. But I had a REALLY FUN TIME hating it. Make of that what you will.