Elizabeth I was so sensitive about Henry IV – the usurper who dethroned Richard II some 200 years earlier - that she locked a historian in the Tower simply for writing a book about him.

Shakespeare therefore had to tread carefully in tackling the subject dramatically, so rather than focusing on the monarch (and possibly giving Elizabeth’s subjects ideas) he concentrated instead on everyone except Henry IV, from his wastrel son, the rebels plotting against him and, of course, the magnificent Falstaff.

The RSC’s touring production of Henry IV Part I leaves the audience in no doubt of Prince Hal’s loose-living ways from the very beginning. While the kingdom and Henry IV’s reign are under threat, his son and heir cavorts with the fat, old lush Falstaff.

We are introduced to the pair as a giant bed rolls towards the front of the stage within which some vigorous gymnastic activity appears to be taking place. At its culmination emerge not just one, but two, strumpets as well as Prince Hal, while Falstaff clambers out from the bottom of it.

Anthony Sher’s rollicking portrayal of the aged knight was a masterclass in perfection, with a voice once liltingly posh, then gurglingly drunk. Initially a sad sympathetic character, his hands shook while he looked for his first tankard of sack of the day, but his comedy, japery, expediency and lies soon left that behind.

The reason Shakespeare has survived and is still performed is not just the beauty of the language and Shakespeare’s power as a writer, but also because the characters and emotions are just as recognisable to a 21st century audience as they were to the 17th century ones.

While Hal (Alex Hassell) puts aside his carousing to help his father battle his foes, Falstaff doesn’t see the point.

His cynical speech about honour on the battlefield could just as easily have been about the recent unpopular wars in Afgnanistan and Iraq. Does honour set a broken leg or benefit the soldier who died on the battlefield? Why bother amassing a decent army when they are all going to be killed, or fighting when you can play dead and walk away unscathed?

This is a play of spellbinding storytelling and magnificent performances, from Sher’s spectacular Falstaff, to Hassell’s impressive Hal.

Also worth mentioning was the standout portrayal of Trevor White’s almost manic Hotspur, so fizzing with energy and desire to get onto the battle field that his body was unable to contain it.

Henry IV Part II continues at the Theatre Royal tonight, before transferring to London. Beg, borrow or steal to get a ticket, it’s an unmissable show.