SHAKESPEARE wrote a whole suite of history plays, collectively known as “The Wars of the Roses”, which deal with an epic battle between two closely-related families.

It was Shakespeare’s chance to create positive propaganda for his queen, Elizabeth, but as the discovery of the remains of Richard III in 2012 have reminded us, he often played havoc with history.

Director of Canberra’s Mill Theatre Lexi Sekuless is happy to go along with the Bard’s version of events as she embarks on a series of productions looking at the Henry VI plays, staging them rock ‘n’ roll/heavy-metal style as she did with “Rockspeare Richard III” live and online at EPIC in 2020 during the darkest days of covid, what Sekuless likes to call “our winter of discontent”.

That was the time of sparse audiences sitting at enforced separate tables, but now, in a tiny space, with new music and a new costume designer, Sekuless, a known Shakespeare tragic, is determined to continue the Rockspeare tradition with “Rockspeare Henry VI Part I”.

“What really matters in the play are the factions and the words ‘faction’ or ‘factious’ occur 40 times in the history plays,” she says.

The show will begin at the death of hero-king Henry V, when disaffection set in, partly caused by the weakness of his saintly son, Henry and partly by the machinations of his fearsome wife, Marguerite of Anjou, whom we meet briefly in this play.

Joan of Arc makes an appearance, typecast by anti-Gallic Shakespeare as a witch, but her curse sets things in motion.

Suffice it to say that the family relationships are complicated, but roughly, the politically astute York family to which Richard III belongs, versus Henry and his equally conniving political supporters.

It’ll be staged in the tiny confines of the Mill Theatre where there won’t be space for a full rock band.

Happily, Sekuless’ next-door neighbour in the precinct is the composer and sound engineer Andre Pinzon, who has created music to be pre-recorded and moderated so we won’t be blasted out of our seats, also creating different sonic worlds for the French and the English.

Sekuless introduces me to her new costume designer Tania Jobson, who arrives with what she calls her “costume Bible” full of ideas and lots of designs, important since with a cast of 10, entirely non-binary and female casting and a fair bit of doubling, the characters need to be distinguished from each other clearly.

Jobson, a registered nurse for 30 years as she moved around the world as a military wife, now has a flourishing business where Sekuless found her by the simple expedient of googling “Canberra costume designer” – it came up straightaway.

She is enjoying the challenges of stage design. Some decisions are obvious – blue and gold for the French; red and white for the English, but also a punk-rock look for the riff-raff – think black and silver studs, spikes and chains.

Sekuless admits “Henry VI Part I”, probably not written by Shakespeare alone, is lacking, so she’s pinched a terrific monologue (“uneasy lies, the head that wears the crown”) from “Henry IV, Part 2”.

Most of the history plays are standalones, but not this one. Nonetheless, given the public appetite for mini-series, she thinks people will come back for parts two and three. 

The rock ‘n’ roll idea came from a visit to a concert at Kambri ANU with her brother Tim where everybody stood for the whole gig. Later, while Tim and choreographer Annette Sharpe were choreographing a fight scene for “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”, they realised the potential of a rock band in recreating a battle as a sonic experience. 

“We are definitely doing it differently, and why not?” Lexi Sekuless asks.

Shakespeare, bloody intrigue, costumes covered in bling and a rock sound – what could possibly go wrong? 

“Rockspeare Henry VI Part I,” At Mill Theatre at Dairy Road, October 18-November 4, with previews beginning October 11.