Henry IV Part One
****
Henry IV Part Two
**

In theatre as in life, we must sometimes be careful what we wish for. For too long now, no actor at the Globe has been good enough to turn in the sort of performance that we came to expect and enjoy from Mark Rylance during his tenure on Bankside.

Yet this double bill from artistic director Dominic Dromgoole boasts not one but two sparkling star turns, so splendid in fact that they quite destabilise the delicate balance of the productions.

For my money, Jamie Parker was by far the most talented of Alan Bennett’s original History Boys, and his Hal is a delight from start to finish.

With great attention to detail, Parker takes us with him on his lengthy, achingly self-conscious journey from an Eastcheap rabble-rouser of a Prince of Wales to a chastened and stately King Henry V, dominating this difficult stage with a confidence that is terrific to watch.

Parker doesn’t have sole dibs on the limelight, though, as that corrupt carouser Falstaff is presented with wry conviction by the ever-magnificent Roger Allam, instantly at home with the Globe’s rough and ready ethos.

Allam and Parker play off each other with joyous ease, reaching their zenith in the lovely scene in which Hal, high-fiving the groundlings in his joy at getting the upper hand, revels in revealing the extent of Falstaff’s cowardice during the Gad’s Hill robbery.

The downside of such excellence manifests itself differently in each part. In Part One, the rebels threatening the fragmenting reign of Hal’s father Henry (Oliver Cotton, nicely suggesting a monarch crippled by introspection) have not only the weight of history, but the balance of acting skills against them.

Part Two, already a lugubrious and largely pointless retread of its predecessor, suffers from lengthy periods without Parker.

After the interminably tedious wittering of those old fools Shallow and Silence, it snaps into focus belatedly for Henry’s deathbed reconciliation with Hal and then the young King’s chillingly clinical renunciation of his surrogate father, Falstaff.

I’d cut and paste the last half hour of Two onto the end of One and be done with it. And I’d offer Parker the role of Hamlet for next season.

In rep until October 3. Information: 020 7401 9919; shakespeares-globe.org