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The Prince and the Pretender
Dramatis Personae PERKIN Warbeck – or is it Richard, Duke of York, the rightful King of England? 24 years old. HENRY Tudor – King Henry VII of England, or is he? 40 years old, but looks much older. Place and Time A dungeon in the Tower of London, autumn 1497. Lights up on PERKIN, chained to a Sound of a door opening. Enter HENRY That’ll be all, jailor.
Well, well, well, what do we have here? The weaver’s boy who would be King.
You’ve come a long way, young Master Perkin. From making cloth to making yourself a Prince. And now you’ve made yourself a prisoner. My prisoner.
I had half a mind to kill you as soon as you were captured, Perkin; after all, you burned my favorite palace to the ground. Forget treason – arson is a capital offense too!
Then I realized that you’re worth more to me alive than dead. Far more. After all, Perkin, you have many followers, don’t you? People who’ve spent 6 years pretending you’re a Prince, people who I want to humiliate. Your confession will save your life.
Did you hear me, boy? Your confession will save your life. Just admit that you are not, and never have been, Richard the Fourth of England, and we’ll let you go. You can even go back to Brussels – or whatever village you were plucked out of by that bitch Margaret –
PERKIN
My Aunt Margaret is not a bitch!
HENRY Your accent’s good. You’ve been taught well. PERKIN My mother raised me – HENRY To speak Flemish – PERKIN To speak English. Which is more than you, brought up in some Welsh witch’s lair, will ever manage. HENRY Your mother never spoke a word of English. PERKIN After you shut her up in a nunnery – true. HENRY False. Your mother swore to my agents – in Flemish – that you were hers. PERKIN My mother was Queen of England. HENRY My, my, you are stubborn. PERKIN You are the stubborn one, Henry Tudor. You’ve yet to acknowledge me as your rightful King.
Mock all you want – you can’t change the facts. A Prince chained and manacled is still a Prince. HENRY And a peasant with a crown on his head is still a peasant. PERKIN You’ve described yourself perfectly. HENRY How so? PERKIN You have the power, but not the dignity, that becomes a Prince. HENRY And you do, Perkin – ? PERKIN My name is Richard Plantagenet – HENRY And I’m the Pope!
PERKIN You don’t believe me? HENRY Would I have had my spies chase you across half of Europe, slaughtered your followers on the field of battle, and locked you up in the Tower if I did? PERKIN You are far from the first to doubt who I am. Aunt Margaret, the King of France, the King of Scotland – many more who knew me as a boy! – they doubted me at first. Test me. Prove that I’m not Richard the Fourth, your rightful King. HENRY I know your tricks. Your name is Perkin Warbeck, and you’re pretending to be a boy who’s been dead for 14 years. Your aunt trained you to be like that boy in every way possible, from his voice to his clothes to his manners. You were used a pawn to try and kill me, to destroy my realm. That’s it. And if you refuse to admit it, then I’ll let the rack do the “proving” for me.
PERKIN You realize that if I’m tortured I might say anything, yes?
You might well get me to say that I am “Perkin Warbeck”. You might also get me to say I’m a pink-and-blue unicorn. Torture can do that to people. But if you want the truth…
HENRY Go on… PERKIN You’re a clever man – so it’s said. I understand you know every single thing about my life that your henchmen have dug up for you. So go ahead - unmask me, prove I’m not the man I claim to be. But if you walk out, you’ll never know.
Unless marked by a pause, the HENRY Where were you born? PERKIN Westminster Palace, in the Queen’s bedchamber. HENRY The date? PERKIN February the 21st, the year of our Lord 1473. HENRY Your nurse? PERKIN Maud Baker. HENRY What did she look like? PERKIN Short, pudgy, brown hair tied back. HENRY How many teeth was she missing? PERKIN Seven. Three in the front, two on each side.
HENRY Who was your teacher? PERKIN Which one? HENRY All of them. PERKIN Robert Caxton taught me letters. The Bishop of Wells taught me religion and history. My uncle Anthony taught me to ride and wield a sword. HENRY You forgot your Latin teacher. PERKIN Thomas Covington was Edward’s Latin tutor. We took lessons together from time to time, but he wasn’t mine. HENRY Is that because he publicly swore you were an imposter? PERKIN Was that because you bribed him?
HENRY He said it, that’s what counts. Where were you when your father died? PERKIN My brother and I were at Greenwich. [Pronounced “GREN-itch”] HENRY Who broke the news to you? PERKIN Lord Hastings. HENRY Who was Lord Hastings married to? PERKIN Anne Mowbray. HENRY What happened to their son? PERKIN You killed him. HENRY He was a traitor – PERKIN At the age of 8?
HENRY What happened the night you were rescued? PERKIN My father, King Edward the Fourth was the grandson of the 5th son of Edward the Third, his legitimacy unchallenged. My brother, King Edward the Fifth - God rest his soul! – was murdered in the Tower of London. I, having been rescued from the same fate – HENRY When were you rescued? PERKIN The night of September the 16th. The King sent 2 henchmen to smother Edward and me in our sleep – HENRY Their names? PERKIN Robert Tyrell and – HENRY That snake! PERKIN You know him? HENRY He’s the Governor of Calais, fool. PERKIN You’re the foolish one. He’s loyal to his King. HENRY So he is
You were smuggled out of the Tower. Why not Edward? PERKIN The other man killed him. Tyrell took pity on me, told me to lie still, waited until the other man was gone, and then hid me on a ship for Flanders. HENRY What was the ship’s cargo? PERKIN Wool.
HENRY I knew you were lying. Now I have my proof. There was no ship with wool going to Flanders in 1483. Your Uncle sent alltrading vessels to Calais during his reign. PERKIN I know that. HENRY So you admit it. Good. I’ll send for the lawyers to take your confession.
PERKIN I never said what year the ship sailed. Or which King sent Tyrell.
But you already knew that. HENRY You can’t prove it. PERKIN I don’t have to. The world knows you have royal blood on your hands.
So tell me, Henry Tudor – what did you say when you killed my Uncle and found out his nephews were alive and well in the Tower? In 1485? HENRY Shut up. PERKIN What did you say, Henry? Come now, tell me. HENRY You’re Perkin Warbeck! You’re not Richard Plantagenet. I know it, I know it. PERKIN Prove it! HENRY I saw the body! Tyrell – he showed me the corpses. We had them buried under the stairwell – PERKIN Two boys, yes – but not mine. You sent a page to Tyrell with the execution order. Where is he now?
I win. HENRY You lose. You already lost. I didn’t see the faces...well, such is the fate of Kings, to be betrayed from time to time. Lord Tyrell will die for it. As for you…it may be you are King Richard IV. It may be you fled abroad, spent years hiding in a Flemish fishing village, before magically reemerging at your Aunt’s court. It may be you raised an army to regain what was rightfully yours, marched on London, and damned near beat me in battle. But you know what, boy? I say you are Perkin Warbeck. I say you are the son of a weaver, no royal blood whatsoever. More to the point, myhistorians will say you are Perkin Warbeck. They’ll write it down, publish it, make it fact. Memories fade, but books and records live on. PERKIN So tell me, Henry Tudor – who is the Prince, and who is the Pretender? HENRY I will make quite sure that no one ever knows. You can go to your execution proclaiming otherwise, but it won’t matter. My dynasty will go on, yours will wither. Besides, people love a good legend. It keeps them guessing.
Nothing more to say, your Majesty? A pity. After I have my torturers tear out your tongue, you won’t have another chance. Jailor!
PERKIN
I am Richard, King of England. I am Richard, King of England. I am Richard…do I have the inflection right? Do I, Margaret? Blackout.
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