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King Lear: Plays
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The Fool in King Lear is a gnomic and often misunderstood presence. In the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, shortened versions of the play omitted the character altogether. Although the role has been reduced for this production, it has ... been daringly reconfigured. Rather than a manic young whippersnapper—as the character is commonly acted—Michael Bryant plays the Fool as a decrepit hanger-on as ancient and tired as Lear himself. Bryant is like a dyspeptic vaudevillian gamely firing zingers from the dais at a Friars Club roast. It’s an inspired idea and hints that Lear and his Fool have accompanied one another into a bitter late-life.
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A strong, 6 pages analysis of how King Lear is a study in duality. The theme of appearance versus reality is a reoccurring one throughout the play and as the writer demonstrates, nothing is as it seems. Bibliography lists 3 sources.
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This production of King Lear will sweep you away with its magnitude, power and raw sensuality. This Lear contains nudity, extreme realistic violence and decadence. The rich poetic language and the scope of Falls’ vision with strong references to the Bosnian-Serbian wars works to underscore the nihilistic tone of the play. Kudos for the Goodman and Robert Falls for daring to take adventurous chances with this classic. It succeeds far beyond one’s expectations. This is a splendid theatrical experience.
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As King Lear, 80-year-old Alvin Epstein proves himself the little engine that could. Diminutive but spry, beneath a flying spray of white hair, Epstein is a cocky, muscular Lear full of scathing fury (watch him try to tamp it down) that turns tyrannical or teary and finally quite dotty, as the little old king trots the fields near Dover in a baggy diaper. Having played the Fool to Orson Welles’s 1956 king and Gloucester to F. Murray Abraham’s at American Repertory Theatre, the always-a-bridesmaid-never-a-bride Epstein finally takes the veil and shows he’s (in the Bard’s words) "worth the whistle." Moreover, he has moments — as when he forces Jennie Israel’s substantial Goneril to the ground with the force of his curse or when, recognizing Cordelia, he violently lurches himself forward to kneel at her feet — that startle.
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The play begins with King Lear taking the decision to abdicate the throne and divide his kingdom among his three daughters: Goneril, Regan and Cordelia. The eldest two are already married, while Cordelia is much sought after as a bride, partly because she is her father's favourite. In a fit of senile vanity, he suggests a contest—each daughter shall be accorded lands according to how much she demonstrates her love for him in speech. But the plan misfires. Cordelia refuses to outdo the flattery of her elder sisters, as she feels it would only cheapen her true feelings to flatter him purely for profit. Lear, in a fit of pique, divides her share of the kingdom between Goneril and Regan, and Cordelia is banished.
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[One] focus of attention on Lear is its relationship to William Shakespeare’s play King Lear. As the playwright has noted, it is important to note that Bond’s Lear be seen not simply as an adaptation of Shakespeare’s play but as a comment on that drama. In various interviews, Bond has said that current audience reaction to Shakespeare’s King Lear, which focuses on the artistic experience of the play, is far removed from the way Shakespeare’s audience would have responded. Bond’s purpose is to make Shakespeare’s play more politically effective, more likely to cause people to question their society and themselves, rather than simply to have an uplifting aesthetic experience. As a socialist playwright, Bond writes plays that are not meant merely to entertain but to help to bring about change in society.
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