Harold Bloom calls Falstaff “essentially a satirist turned against all power.” (Harold Bloom, Shakespeare, The Invention of the Human, Penguin Group (USA) 1998). In an earlier era, Samuel Johnson said his character illustrates the fact that “no man is more dangerous than he that with a will to corrupt hath the power to please.” In Stacy Keach’s blog on DC Theatre Scene about the production, Chimes at Midnight with Stacy Keach, he echoes this sentiment, describing Falstaff as “a friend who is great fun and one who also poses great danger.” On the other hand, as Keach notes “There is no other character in Shakespeare who so gloriously enjoys being alive as Falstaff does.” Liar, cheat, glutton, reprobate, drunk, lecher–there are not words enough to fully express his negative qualities yet Falstaff is one of the greatest comic creations in English theatre. Auden, Lectures on Shakespeare, Arthur Kirsch, ed., Princeton University Press, 2000). He wants by charm to attach himself to Hal both as a child and as a mother.” (W.H. Auden has said, “Falstaff, like Hamlet, is an actor living in a world of words.” Falstaff, he notes “loves Hal for his youth and power because he can’t manage his own life. Falstaff’s relationship with Prince Hal, King Henry’s son, who is going through a wild period of his youth, is central to the play. ( Jonathan Bate, Soul of the Age, Random House, 2009). Noted for its increased dependence on prose, the piece has comedy, trenchant social commentary, fascinating family and political rivalries, and, of course, Falstaff. The play is “very much a three-hander,” in fact, two-thirds of the dialogue is spoken by only three characters Falstaff, Prince Hal, and his rival Hotspur. The killing of Richard II has deeply affected many of the characters, especially King Henry IV, who was responsible for it, and who took Richard’s crown. It begins with the aftermath of a murder. Henry IV, Part 1 is one of Shakespeare’s most popular plays. Great acting and great writing combine to make this a Falstaff worth seeing again and again. His achievement, and it is naturally an exceptional one, is to portray the many sides of Falstaff, the good and the bad, without judgment, matter-of-factly, with the grace of a dancer and the earthy wisdom of a well-beloved sage. It is a privilege to see Stacy Keach in the role. His authority as an actor informs every aspect of his performance, from the humor to the lies to the brief flashes of anger. He is at the center of Shakespeare Theatre Company’s magnificent Henry IV Part 1, and his bombastic charm vaults the play into the realm of Shakespeare’s finest. Falstaff, like Sherlock Holmes, is one of those characters who are so memorable they almost seem alive.