Let's start with the conclusion: this is a magnificent achievement. Michael Boyd’s epic, audacious presentation of Shakespeare’s eight history plays, which has seen a topnotch RSC ensemble of 34 actors work together on 264 parts for more than two years, reaches a heady pinnacle with this second tetralogy. Through 13 hours of drama we witness, first in sweeping overview and then in intimate close-up, the carnage-strewn cavalcade of the Wars of the Roses and rarely is it less than gripping.

After the golden era of Henry V, when all was centripetal calm, comes centrifugal chaos again as the infant Henry VI accedes to the throne. From the start the threat of schism looms, as Lord Protector Gloucester clashes with the Bishop of Winchester, the house of Lancaster squares up to that of York and the hard-worn territories in France are threatened. The action is unrelenting and blood-soaked and there is a chilling, thrilling sense of Fortune constantly smiling and then turning her wheel once more.

The three parts of Henry VI, although popular in Shakespeare’s own faction-riven times, are among his least known works now and there is, undeniably, something daunting about them, not least on account of their length. Boyd has realised this and thus affords them one of the most vibrantly fast-moving and innovative stagings you’re likely to see. The actors make ingenious use of gangways, balconies and aerial spaces, a method of storytelling so fluid and engaging that intermittent confusion as to which interchangeable lord is which is never allowed to overwhelm the larger, vital sense of a country’s history being thrashed out before us.

As the Henrys progress, the monomaniacal presence of Richard, son of the formidable Duke of York, looms ever larger. How much more resonance this take on Richard III then has, anchored in the historical context that allows us fully to appreciate the ramifications of the “hell hound’s” gradual slither to power. As if to signal a change of dramatic pace from the breathless trilogy that precedes it, the production switches into the slick, black modern dress of some anonymous corporation.

With even tiny supporting parts brought to vivid life, it would be fairest simply to copy out the entire cast list.

Nonetheless, the truly notable performances come, as they must, from the leads, from Jonathan Slinger’s machine-of-evil Richard III and Geoffrey Streatfeild’s coldly calculating Suffolk, lover of Margaret, Henry’s queen. Chuk Iwuji moves Henry impressively forward, from a tremulous young man to a ruler of maturity and reflection. Never, though, is he allowed to dominate the narrative that bears his name, a fact that affords the all-important toehold to the contumelious house of York.

These four plays aren’t over-endowed with parts for women, yet my turn of the morning/afternoon/evening/ following evening came from Katy Stephens, who doubles as Joan of Arc and Margaret.

As the latter she is outstanding, morphing from an adulterous vixen into a breastplate-wearing Boadicea, marshalling forces to defend the crown when Henry has forsaken all hope. We leave the Roundhouse with so much, not least a ringing reminder of what Aristotle taught all those centuries ago about the eternal, unchanging inadvisability of hubris.

In rep until 25 May (0844 482 8008, www.thehistories.co.uk)