Loyalty and Heredity-- King Henry VIII covers the period of Henry's reign from shortly after he becomes king to the birth of Elizabeth who would one day become queen and for whom the play was written. The firing of a cannon during the very first performance of this play caused a fire that burnt the Globe theater to the ground. Heat not a furnace for your foe so hot That it do singe yourself. We may outrun By violent swiftness that which we run at And lose by over-running.