S44 Ep6
The Hollow Crown: The Wars of the Roses | Henry VI Part 1
PBS talks with the cast and director of The Hollow Crown: The Wars of the Roses, a lavish three-part follow-up to the BAFTA winning The Hollow Crown. The Wars of the Roses, which picks up the story with epic film versions of Henry VI (in two parts) and Richard III, comes to Great Performances on three consecutive Sundays -- beginning December 11 at 9 p.m.
Features
Clip | Battle Scene | Henry VI, Part 1
The Hollow Crown and Game of Thrones Remix Shakespeare
Cast Interview: Stanley Townsend as Warwick
Cast Interview: Adrian Dunbar as Plantagenet
Cast Interview: Anton Lesser as Exeter
Cast Interview: Hugh Bonneville as Gloucester
Cast Interview: Sophie Okonedo as Margaret
Cast Interview: Tom Sturridge as Henry VI
Clip | The Arrest of the Duchess | Henry VI, Part 1
The Hollow Crown: The Wars of the Roses | Henry VI Part 1
The Hollow Crown: The Wars of the Roses | Full Series
TRANSCRIPT
Know us by these colors for thy foes.
This pale and angry rose a symbol white of my blood drinking age.
It is some of the the most complex early Shakespearean language but some of the most extraordinary visceral gut punching language in action that you get in any of his dramas.
Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this sun of York.
It's really the story of a country having a nervous breakdown.
It's a country turning against itself; It's a country where kind of a moral vacuum opens up and things descend from order into total chaos and mayhem.
This chunk of The Hollow Crown starting with the death of Henry V and ending with Richard III -- That's an amazing sweep of history told at pell mell pace.
With fantastic characters that are all at each others' throats.
Henry VI -- he's a boy, he's not even proper King.
He has a lord protector in the Duke of Gloucester.
He's someone who became King when he was an infant and so he didn't even know he wanted to be king.
Ah, wretched man! Would I had died a maid And never seen thee, never borne thee son.
Margaret -- she was such a force of nature.
Think she's troubled -- there are lots of things going on.
But you can see how it sort of starts -- how she becomes that person.
When you take it out of the theater and put it in its own surroundings, it can be very exciting.
And it could fire somebody's imagination.
Who intercepts me in my expedition?
O, she that might have intercepted thee, By strangling thee in her accursèd womb, From all the slaughters, wretch, that thou hast done.
A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse!
It's such powerful stuff.
In all his words, there's something to apply to every part of your life.
These are incredibly powerful narratives that this change, this shift in history, shift in power is a very compelling narrative.
It pulls you through.
These days are dangerous.
Virtue is choked with foul ambition.
