Book Note: Henry V: Kenneth Branagh's Screenplay

Branagh, Kenenth. Henry V by William Shakespeare: Screenplay and Introduction by Kenneth Branagh. New York: W. W. Norton, 1989.

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You might expect someone who teaches Shakespeare and film to pay a great deal of attention to screenplays.

Once again, Bardfilm foils your expectations.

But I've been paying more attention to them recently—see my comments on the screenplay for Kenneth Branagh's Much Ado About Nothing. I'm not quite at the stage of requiring a screenplay as a textbook for my Shakespeare and film course, but that day may come (the screenplay for the Branagh Hamlet is very tempting, for instance).

Before looking at that screenplay, I looked at Branagh's screenplay for Henry V. I've used that for some time because I find the descriptions to be very telling. My instinct is to read the film itself without depending on outside influences. But it's nice to have my speculative claims about a scene in a film confirmed with reference to the screenplay.

Let me show you two interesting moments. The first is the incorporation of a scene from 1 Henry IV (and a line from 2 Henry IV) into the film. Note the stage directions (film directions? . . . I'm uncertain of the terminology here) surrounding Hal's voiceover "I do. I will" and "I know thee not, old man."

Falstaff seems able to read the message of the voiceover just from the looks Hal gives him.

Of perhaps more interest is the way the screenplay talks about the scene after the Battle of Agincourt. If you recall, there's a moment where some women come forward through the chaotic aftermath of the battle. They're quickly moved to the side by the French Mountjoy. Here's what the screenplay has to say:

I think we probably easily gather that these women are the mothers and daughters of the French soldiers who have died in the battle. But I don't know that we'd get all this from the visuals themselves:

As he passe[s] MONTJOY, French women rush toward him screaming.  They recognise him as the man to blame.  MONJOY holds them back as HENRY passes and finally moves onto a cart where the bodies of the dead boys are being piled.

I'm glad to have the screenplay to give us that extra possibility—that they're running at Henry because they blame him for the losses of their husbands and fathers.

More soon on the Branagh Hamlet screenplay!

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Book Note: Tiger, Tiger, Burning Bright!: An Animal Poem for Each Day of the Year

Waters, Fiona, ed.. Tiger, Tiger, Burning Bright!: An Animal Poem for Each Day of the Year. Illus. Britta Teckentrup. Boston: Candlewick Press, 2021.

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Do you remember the Saturday Night Live "More Cowbell" sketch? It involves a musical performance which is constantly interrupted with a cry for there to be "more cowbell" over and over again.

Well, I feel a bit like that.  "More Shakespeare," you can imagine me crying, over and over.

Despite that cry for this book, I think it's terrific. The subtitle basically tells you what you need to know, but I'm providing examples of some of the illustrations to get a flavor of what this anthology does. Here's the eponymous page for January 31:

The illustrations are beautifully done, and the selection of poems is not cliché or old-fashioned (though I tend to gravitate toward the old-fashioned ones, like the Blake poem above (and I might have preferred the original spelling, but I won't strain a gnat to swallow a tyger).

Many spreads have multiple poems. Let's take a look at the one that covers June 20 to 22.  It's a nighttime-creatures collation

And there we have our only Shakespeare—right there on Midsummer's Day (depending on how you count it). Nicely played, Waters and Teckentrup.

I still cry "More Shakespeare!" What about twelfth night? What about the Ides of March? But the volume is still most impressive, providing a year's worth of fabulous drawings and interesting poetry.

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Click below to purchase the book from amazon.com
(and to support Bardfilm as you do so).