The Prince is a play by Abigail Thorn in which characters from Shakespeare's plays realise they are trapped in a performance and try to escape. The play ran at the Southwark Playhouse from 19 September 2022 to 8 October 2022 and was released on the streaming service Nebula. The filmed version was first released on 16 February 2023.
Most of the play is set within and involves several characters of Henry IV, Part 1. The programme notes compared The Prince to the play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, which depicts Hamlet from the perspective of two minor characters.[1] It garnered several awards from The Offies and BroadwayWorld as well as mixed reviews from critics.
Plot
Loosely following the plot of Henry IV, Part 1, the play begins with the Battle of Holmedon Hill. Hotspur, a hypermasculine knight who does not yet realise that she[lower-alpha 1] is transgender, leads the English forces to victory against the Scots. But tension runs hot between Hotspur and Prince Hal, who she mocks and derisively calls him a woman. Though Hotspur intends to execute the captured leader of the Scottish forces, she lends him to Prince Hal when he agrees to convince his father to ransom her brother-in-law, who had recently been taken prisoner by Welsh rebels.
Supporting characters reveal that they are modern women, rather than medieval, trapped inside a multiverse of Shakespeare's plays. Sam, a care home manager, explains to Jen that she encountered her in Julius Caesar and implies she rescued her because they are both trans women. Sam shows Jen a magical map with a doorway that would allow them to escape to the real world at the end of Henry IV, Part 1. The two are separated when Hotspur recruits Jen to look for a lost sword. Jen finds the sword, but when Hotspur shakes her hand in gratitude, the two experience a painful, magical force which propels them into new scenes.
Jen finds herself reunited with Sam, Hotspur finds herself at her home, where she has fallen off a ledge while recounting the battle to her wife, Lady Kate. Later, in London, Henry IV refuses to ransom Hotspur's brother-in-law. Prince Hal intimates to Hotspur that the King is angry because Prince Hal is gay. The Prince, secretly in love with Hotspur, suggests that she stay in London and ask the King again to ransom Hotspur's brother-in-law once his mood improves, but Hotspur rebuffs him. Instead, Hotspur, her father, and her uncle agree to join forces with the Scots and the Welsh and rebel against King Henry IV.
Though Sam warns her not to, Jen talks to Hotspur and other Shakespearean characters in an attempt to rescue them as Sam had done for her. As a result, the plot deviates from Henry IV, Part 1 and the characters slip into modern dialect, question their medieval perspectives, and become more aware of the set and audience. Eventually, all characters find themselves in Hamlet, rather than Henry IV, Part 1. Sam confesses that she was trapped playing a minor character in Antony and Cleopatra and for a longer time than she had previously said. Jen apologises and the two make their way back to Henry IV, Part 1.
Back in Henry IV, Part 1, Lady Kate brings Hotspur her sword in preparation for the Battle of Shrewsbury. Still confused by the earlier metatheatre, Lady Kate asks what is happening, but Hotspur tells her that it was just a dream and that she should return home. When she balks at this explanation, Hotspur yells at her that a woman's place is to obey her husband. After Lady Kate leaves angrily, Hotspur's uncle informs her that King Henry IV and Prince Hal have unexpectedly arrived to fight in person and that her father is sick and cannot join the battle. Though Hotspur's uncle advises against it, Hotspur decides to press on.
The battle commences and Sam and Jen traverse through it to find the exit. As Hotspur seeks out Prince Hal to duel him, the exit appears and Jen tries to convince Hotspur to come with them. Sam leaves the play, but Hotspur does not want to leave and Jen stays, promising to help Hotspur when the play restarts. Hotspur and Prince Hal fight, but when Hotspur is mortally wounded, she does not recite the lines that Prince Hal expects her to and dies unheroically.
Again at the beginning of the play, Hotspur, King Henry IV, Prince Hal, and Douglass hesitantly play their parts and slip in and out of their lines. When King Henry IV asks of their whereabouts, Jen greets them and helps them escape. In the final scene, Sam and Jen reunite awkwardly and Jen gives Sam the magical map. Jen invites Sam to join her for lunch with some friends, but Sam declines. Jen then meets with Hotspur, who is dressed as a trans woman, as well as Hal and Kate.[3]
Production
The Prince was written by Abigail Thorn, creator of the YouTube channel Philosophy Tube. Thorn started the channel in 2013, and after she graduated drama school, it became more creative and began incorporating stories, sets and costumes.[4] In 2019, she raised money for the charity Samaritans through a livestream in which she read from the Complete Works of Shakespeare.[5] In addition to a YouTuber, Thorn is a mainstream actor.[4]
As a student, Thorn began drafting The Prince out of an interest in exploring the character Hotspur and writing scenes in verse. Later, after realising she was trans, Thorn redrafted the play through a queer lens and worked with dramaturg Donnacadh O'Briain.[6]:1 minute in[7]:6 minutes in
The premier production of The Prince was funded by and filmed for the streaming service Nebula.[4] The play was performed in the round at the Southwark Playhouse, an Off West End venue.[8][9] It was directed by Natasha Rickman and starred Thorn herself as Hotspur.[9] Due to a conflict of interest, Thorn did not choose the cast,[10] the majority of whom were trans. Much of the crew was queer as well.[7]:28 minutes in Martha Godfrey was tasked with lighting and used colorful, fluorescent bars.[9]
Previews of The Prince began on 15 September 2022 and the play ran from 19 September 2022 to 8 October.[9] The filmed version incorporates recordings of two different nights, as well as close-up shots captured without an audience.[6]:27 minutes in It was released on Nebula on 16 February 2023 and a remastered version was released later that year.[11][12]
Tickets to the play sold out, and even before opening night the production broke even by driving subscriptions to Nebula.[4] During the play's run, Thorn needed a security officer for protection from a stalker.[13]
Themes
The Prince has themes of transgender identity, political radicalisation and unhealthy romantic, platonic and familial relationships.[14][15] Thorn described it as "like The Matrix if it was written in 1600".[15] Thorn said that Shakespeare is fit for trans allegory as his performers were originally all male and his writing was dense with jokes about people dressing up as or being confused about other genders.[10] Thorn's character, Hotspur, is written by Shakespeare as having idealised manhood.[16] Thorn did not see The Prince as a "queer play", but more generally one about "characters who are trapped for all sorts of reasons". She compared it to a period of concealing her gender on Philosophy Tube.[10]
Critical reception
The play received three stars out of five in reviews from The Guardian, The Daily Telegraph, BroadwayWorld, The Stage and The Reviews Hub. A reviewer for The Guardian, Kate Wyver, said that it is an "ambitious if slightly feverish exploration of transgression and transition within Shakespeare's plays" that "playfully questions the performance of gender and the roles we are all assigned". Wyver found that the plot mechanics brought "frustrating confusion", but that the audience would "see these characters anew" through a queer lens, and that "glee oozes from Thorn's playful juggling of Shakespearean language around identity and performance".[17] Claire Allfree of The Daily Telegraph analysed that The Prince fit well with Shakespeare's use of metatheatre and themes of gender and performance, as well as Shakespeare criticism such as the Victorian interpretation of Prince Hamlet as a woman. Allfree compared it to the plays I, Joan (2022) and & Juliet (2019) and reviewed that it was "inclusive and constructive" but had an "untidy energy".[16]
Cindy Marcolina, writing in BroadwayWorld, approved of The Prince's "sacrilegious approach to Shakespeare" in which Thorn explores characters' psychology "with a contemporary lens" but "remaining surprisingly faithful to the original" and re-appraises Shakespeare's language around gender and bravery "under queer lights". However, Marcolina believed that "the scripted ending stands on wobbly feet and the framing never gets the explanation it needs to be satisfyingly convincing".[18]
The Stage's Frey Kwa Hawking praised the multiple trans characters and the ambition of the play, with its "tantalising ideas about the performance of gender and duty". Hawking also praised the "brittle, uneasy energy" that Thorn brought to her character, Hotspur. However, Hawking criticised aspects of the pacing and narrative, such as the "text-heavy" nature, "creaking plot mechanics", length of time spent in Shakespeare's play in the second act. Characterisation was also critiqued by Hawking, including the "under-explored" nature of Kate and Hotspur's marriage and "thinly sketched" relationship between Jen and Sam.[9] Oliver Pattrick of The Reviews Hub similarly praised the transgender themes while criticising the writing, summarising that "it feels like the script needs a further rewrite to realise its full potential". Pattrick suggested that the plot mechanics be made "less prominent", that Hotspur's discovery of her womanhood needed more "depth" and slower pacing, and that the humour was overly reliant on "incongruity of blunt modern slang as a response to elaborate archaic language".[1]
Best Supporting Performer in a New Production of a Play
Mary Malone
Won
Tiana Arnold
Nominated
Notes
↑ Although Hotspur is initially referred to with he/him pronouns by other characters in the play, Thorn refers to the character using she/her pronouns in the script's stage directions.[2]
Related Research Articles
Sir John Falstaff is a fictional character who appears in three plays by William Shakespeare and is eulogised in a fourth. His significance as a fully developed character is primarily formed in the plays Henry IV, Part 1 and Part 2, where he is a companion to Prince Hal, the future King Henry V of England. Falstaff is also featured as the buffoonish suitor of two married women in The Merry Wives of Windsor. Though primarily a comic figure, Falstaff embodies a depth common to Shakespeare's major characters. A fat, vain, and boastful knight, he spends most of his time drinking at the Boar's Head Inn with petty criminals, living on stolen or borrowed money. Falstaff leads the apparently wayward Prince Hal into trouble, and is ultimately repudiated after Hal becomes king.
Cymbeline, also known as The Tragedie of Cymbeline or Cymbeline, King of Britain, is a play by William Shakespeare set in Ancient Britain and based on legends that formed part of the Matter of Britain concerning the early historical Celtic British King Cunobeline. Although it is listed as a tragedy in the First Folio, modern critics often classify Cymbeline as a romance or even a comedy. Like Othello and The Winter's Tale, it deals with the themes of innocence and jealousy. While the precise date of composition remains unknown, the play was certainly produced as early as 1611.
Sir Henry Percy, nicknamed Hotspur or Harry Hotspur, was an English knight who fought in several campaigns against the Scots in the northern border and against the French during the Hundred Years' War. The nickname "Hotspur" was given to him by the Scots as a tribute to his speed in advance and readiness to attack. The heir to a leading noble family in northern England, Hotspur was one of the earliest and prime movers behind the deposition of King Richard II in favour of Henry Bolingbroke in 1399. He later fell out with the new regime and rebelled, and was slain at the Battle of Shrewsbury in 1403 at the height of his fame.
Henry IV, Part 1 is a history play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written not later than 1597. The play dramatises part of the reign of King Henry IV of England, beginning with the battle at Homildon Hill late in 1402, and ending with King Henry's victory in the Battle of Shrewsbury in mid-1403. In parallel to the political conflict between King Henry and a rebellious faction of nobles, the play depicts the escapades of King Henry's son, Prince Hal, and his eventual return to court and favour.
In the First Folio, the plays of William Shakespeare were grouped into three categories: comedies, histories, and tragedies. The histories—along with those of contemporary Renaissance playwrights—help define the genre of history plays. The Shakespearean histories are biographies of English kings of the previous four centuries and include the standalones King John, Edward III and Henry VIII as well as a continuous sequence of eight plays. These last are considered to have been composed in two cycles. The so-called first tetralogy, apparently written in the early 1590s, covers the Wars of the Roses saga and includes Henry VI, Parts I, II & III and Richard III. The second tetralogy, finished in 1599 and including Richard II, Henry IV, Parts I & II and Henry V, is frequently called the Henriad after its protagonist Prince Hal, the future Henry V.
Henry IV, Part 2 is a history play by William Shakespeare believed to have been written between 1596 and 1599. It is the third part of a tetralogy, preceded by Richard II and Henry IV, Part 1 and succeeded by Henry V.
Chimes at Midnight is a 1966 period comedy-drama film written, directed by and starring Orson Welles. The film's plot centres on William Shakespeare's recurring character Sir John Falstaff and the father–son relationship he has with Prince Hal, who must choose between loyalty to his father, King Henry IV, and Falstaff. The English-language film was an international co-production of Spain, France, and Switzerland.
Mistress Nell Quickly is a fictional character who appears in several plays by William Shakespeare. She is an inn-keeper, who runs the Boar's Head Tavern, at which Sir John Falstaff and his disreputable cronies congregate.
Henry IV of England has been depicted in popular culture a number of times.
Henry V of England has been depicted in popular culture a number of times.
Prince Hal is the standard term used in literary criticism to refer to Shakespeare's portrayal of the young Henry V of England as a prince before his accession to the throne, taken from the diminutive form of his name used in the plays almost exclusively by Falstaff. Henry is called "Prince Hal" in critical commentary on his character in Henry IV, Part 1 and Henry IV, Part 2, though also sometimes in Henry V when discussed in the context of the wider Henriad.
Dorothy "Doll" Tearsheet is a fictional character who appears in Shakespeare's play Henry IV, Part 2. She is a prostitute who frequents the Boar's Head Inn in Eastcheap. Doll is close friends with Mistress Quickly, the proprietress of the tavern, who procures her services for Falstaff.
"Henry IV, Part I" and "Henry IV, Part II" are the second and third episodes of the first series of the British television series The Hollow Crown, based on the second set of plays in William Shakespeare's Henriad. The episodes were produced by Sam Mendes, directed and adapted by Richard Eyre and starred Jeremy Irons as King Henry IV, Simon Russell Beale as Falstaff and Tom Hiddleston as Prince Hal. Much of the cast and crew of both episodes overlap and the plot flows directly from the first to the second. The episodes were first broadcast on 7 July and 14 July 2012 on BBC Two.
Edward "Ned" Poins, generally referred to as "Poins", is a fictional character who appears in two plays by William Shakespeare, Henry IV, Part 1 and Henry IV, Part 2. He is also mentioned in The Merry Wives of Windsor. Poins is Prince Hal's closest friend during his wild youth. He devises various schemes to ridicule Falstaff, his rival for Hal's affections.
The King is a 2019 epic historical drama film directed by David Michôd, based on several plays from William Shakespeare's Henriad. The screenplay was written by Michôd and Joel Edgerton, who both produced the film with Brad Pitt, Dede Gardner, Jeremy Kleiner, and Liz Watts. The King includes an ensemble cast led by Timothée Chalamet as the Prince of Wales and later King Henry V of England, alongside Edgerton, Sean Harris, Lily-Rose Depp, Robert Pattinson, and Ben Mendelsohn.
Owen Glendower is a character in William Shakespeare's play Henry IV, Part 1 based on the historical Owain Glyndŵr. Glendower is referred to in Henry IV, Part Two, but he does not have a speaking role in that play.
Abigail Thorn is an English YouTuber, actress, and playwright, best known for producing the YouTube channel Philosophy Tube.
Nebula is a video-on-demand streaming service provider. Launched by the Standard Broadcast content management agency in 2019 to complement its creators' other distribution channels, the platform has since accumulated over 650,000 subscribers, making it the largest creator-owned internet streaming platform.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
