Matt Ball, Patrick Harvey, Samantha Blinn, Chasen Schneider and Ariana Karp discuss Act IV of King Henry IV, Part I. Topics include:

• Mainly expository nature of Act IV 
• Themes of sickness and disease through the language of the rebellion
• Vernon’s rhapsodic reverie about Prince Hal
• The dark and cynical observations about the foots soldiers as “food for powder” aka cannon fodder
• Hotspur ultimately is the one person who makes the decision about exactly when the battle will be fought
• Hotspur’s explanation of the rebel’s grievances is the clearest in the play when he is explaining to the Earl of Blunt
• Last scene of Act IV as an oddity-the only time that we see anyone from the ecclesiastical orders in the play
• The repercussions of the battle of Shrewsbury as the beginning of Hal’s military education - looking at the parallels in the two battles in Henry V (Harfleur and Agincourt)
• Falstaff as a ‘wild child’

Joe Armstrong as Hotspur and Michelle Dockery as Lady Kate Percy in The Hollow Crown (King Henry IV Part I).