Bringing Shakespeare’s history plays to China ‘very cool’, RSC lead actor says ahead of tour

Playing in front of audiences who don’t know the characters or what’s going to happen next excites Alex Hassell, who plays Henry V in a Royal Shakespeare Company production, one of three of the Bard’s history plays the troupe will stage on a 2016 tour of China, including Hong Kong

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Alex Hassell (front) as Henry V in the Royal Shakespeare Company production of Shakespeare’s Henry V that will be touring China in February and March.

Published: 11:30am, 31 Dec 2015Updated: 3:05pm, 4 Jan 2016

Britain’s Royal Shakespeare Company embarks on its first major tour of China this year, presenting the Bard’s history plays about bloodshed, honour and kingship in medieval England to a new and potentially vast audience.

Marking 400 years since William Shakespeare’s death, the prestigious theatre company will take productions of Henry IV Part I, Henry IV Part II and Henry V to Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong in February and March. The Hong Kong performances will be part of the city’s Arts Festival, which kicks off on February 19.

A scene from the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Henry IV Part 1.

The trilogy is not well known in China and most in the audience are likely to be seeing the plays for the first time. The romantic tragedy Romeo and Juliet, for instance, would probably be more well known.

On the other hand, Shakespeare is enduringly popular among Chinese audiences, and the storylines and colourful characters in the history plays should make for a compelling show, say the organisers.

“The audience will be sitting on the edge of their seats, genuinely wanting to know what happens next,” says Joseph Graves, artistic director of Peking University’s Institute of World Theatre and Film.

That is a thrilling prospect for the cast and crew as they seek to bring the courts and bloody battlefields of England and France to life in 21st-century China.