Shakespeare's Henry V Act IV, Scene III by Lawrence Olivier


Crispian's Day speechafter that is several minutes of the battle scenes at Agincourt. Not the most accurate battle scenes, of course, but the importance of the famed English longbow to the eventual victory is given proper emphasis.

Fine music by William Walton.

Laurence Olivier ... King Henry V
Gerald Case ... Earl of Westmoreland
Griffith Jones ... Earl of Salisbury
Ralph Truman ... Mountjoy

From the film "The Chronicle History of King Henry the Fift with His Battell Fought at Agincourt in France" (1944)

directed by Lord Olivier

James Agee on Olivier's "Henry V":

...Olivier does many other beautiful pieces of reading and playing. His blood-raising reply to the French Herald's ultimatum is not just that; it is a frank, bright exploitation of the moment for English ears, amusedly and desperately honored as such, in a still gallant and friendly way, by both Herald and King. His Crispin's Dayoration is not just a brilliant bugle-blat; it is the calculated yet self-exceeding improvisation, at once self-enjoying and selfless, of a young and sleepless leader, rising to a situtation wholly dangerous and glamorous, and wholly new to him. Only one of the many beauties of the speech as he gives it is the way in which the King seems now to exploit his sincerity, no to be possessed by it, riding like an unexpectedly mounting wave the astounding size of his sudden proud awareness of the country morning, of his moment in history, of his responsibilty and competence, of being full-bloodedlyalive, and of being about to die.






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