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Post by alexandra on Feb 12, 2016 15:47:56 GMT
Why, Marwood - you are not a gentleman! Hmm, did a feminist just accuse someone actively suggesting a woman shouldn't take her clothes off of ungallant behaviour? I might need to rethink this.  Just to show I'm not sexist (and also because I don't want to be known as 'King Leer' - I don't want to see SRB nekkid either.
Just ageist and/or fattist.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 12, 2016 16:18:30 GMT
I mean, I'd chuck in a devil's advocate "well, some people are uncomfortable with all nudity, or they're okay with nudity but not in the context of a vulnerable person disrobing in a storm", but considering today's other major conversation in the Plays board has been people booking to see a play purely because the handsome young lead actor is strongly rumoured to completely disrobe, I'd be inclined to agree somewhat with alexandra...
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Post by Snciole on Feb 12, 2016 16:29:06 GMT
Part of me feels like Glenda would, I also think a Helen Mirren Lear would disrobe but I can't imagine Dame Judi. This is a new thread, isn't it? Who would get naked on stage? The PC answer is I will take whatever nudity/dogs I can get if I have paid good money |
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Post by loureviews on Feb 12, 2016 20:48:56 GMT
Well, if Frances de La Tour could do it as Cleopatra ...
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Post by chip on Feb 12, 2016 22:36:21 GMT
Didn't Kathryn Hunter play Lear?
Favourite Lears should be -- probably was -- a different thread but mine (vs. Wilkins, Howard, McKellen, Jacobi, Pryce, Russell-Beale) had another atypical lead: the then 23 year-old Nonso Anozie (RSC 'Academy' at The Young Vic).
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Post by mrbarnaby on Feb 12, 2016 23:23:21 GMT
Blimey.. This is pretty exciting news!
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Post by Jan on Feb 13, 2016 9:26:53 GMT
Which was the 0.5 of a Lear you didn't find boring, Jan? I know it had mixed reviews but I found about half of the scenes in the Rupie Goold/Pete Postlethwaite one totally gripping - some scenes like the mock trial one are beyond redemption though. Just in terms of the performance of Lear I thought Jacobi's red-faced turn was the best. McKellen, as with many others, was good up to the storm scene but not after. This year I will see Michael Pennington play it, so one a year is enough. Actually I always think directors should start the play at Queen Lear's funeral, then it makes total sense of why he's giving his kingdom away. |
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Post by loureviews on Feb 13, 2016 10:33:25 GMT
Didn't Kathryn Hunter play Lear? Yes nearly twenty years ago! And she was excellent. |
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Post by David J on Feb 13, 2016 11:19:41 GMT
Ian McKellan was my first Lear back in 2007, then it was 4 years before I saw another King Lear. Now I see 1-2 lears every year.
There was a time where I found Lear an unsympathetic character. Sure what he goes through is horrible, but all I could think was he rather asked for it for the way he treats everyone. It is surprising that he lived for so long without someone opposing his absolute kingship. Richard II and Charles I didn't last to an old age did they.
It was only Derek Jacobi's performance that changed my mind. I recently went to the NT archive to see the broadcast recording again, and loved it all over again. The only King Lear I cried for at the end. He still plays the absolute king but he acts like a little boy, especially during his encounter with the blind Gloucester. Maybe that's who Jacobi perceives Lear, or perhaps it is because of old age. Watching his descent into madness is both mesmerising and heartbreaking. Pacing back and forth, trying to exert authority, ignoring any advice, but breaking down in the most harrowing way.
So I don't think Lear is an unsympathetic character, but a worthy and challenging role for actors to tackle. Making him sympathetic as well as commanding, particularly emphasising what fatherly side there is to him, which Jacobi did brilliantly with a touching reunion scene.
I just like seeing King Lear again and again just to see another well known actor take on the role. More than Hamlet.
My favourite king lears would be Derek Jacobi, Ian McKellan, and Frank Langella. Others were mixed including Brian Blessed, Greg Hicks (still looked too young for the role), Barrie Rutter, Jonathan Pryce. David Haig was less a king/east-end crime lord and more like an accountant, though he vyed towards a more sympathetic Lear like Jacobi
I just hated Simon Russell Beale's interpretation. As the makers in the pre-broadcast interviews said, how do you turn Santa Claus into King Lear. The answer is have him dress up in black leather and act EXTREMELY mean, spitting out the words like he had a grudge against them.
I would like to see the version where Queen Lear's death led to Lear giving up his kingdom. It feels like a better reason than just "because I can do whatever I like". I never really like it when plays/musicals make a fuss about a particular character and keep their motivations and backstory vague
Or even don't build the character up well. Gloucester is a famous character but initially I just find him a foolish man who falls for Edmund's plot, and only comes into his own when he is blinded |
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Post by Deleted on Feb 13, 2016 12:09:48 GMT
The problem with Gloucester is people are so quick to have Edmund portrayed as the obvious (to the audience at least) villain of the piece and Edgar as the clueless patsy. Where the Almeida production went really well was to have Edgar as a boozing womanising wastrel, which meant it was plausible that Gloucester would be so quick to mistrust him, added justification to his preferring of Edmund, actually gave Richard Goulding a character journey to go on, and emphasised Gloucester's hinted-at disregard for women by showing how his son now had it as well. The whole Gloucester family plot just doesn't work if you have two goodie-goodies being tricked by the bad boy of the family, it just makes the characters less interesting and less believable.
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Post by Jan on Feb 13, 2016 13:42:42 GMT
.... it just makes the characters less interesting and less believable. Always a grim moment as you wait for Poor Tom to come capering on, wondering what enormity the costume department will have perpetrated, similar to the wait for Caliban. |
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Post by lynette on Feb 13, 2016 13:48:26 GMT
.... it just makes the characters less interesting and less believable. Always a grim moment as you wait for Poor Tom to come capering on, wondering what enormity the costume department will have perpetrated, similar to the wait for Caliban. Gonna be a treat at RSC this year with Ariel being something techie. I know I'll hate it. Agree always fun waiting for Poor Tom, nude or not nude. |
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Post by Deleted on Feb 13, 2016 14:40:49 GMT
At the Tobacco Factory, Poor Tom actually had pins stuck into him. I'm glad the majority of productions overlook that line in the text. *shivers*
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Post by alexandra on Feb 13, 2016 14:53:07 GMT
Didn't see Postlethwaite. Seen about 15 and my favourite so far is Robert Stephens. He was dying, but I didn't know that. He just was unutterably moving. It's not the father/daughter stuff that gets me but the growing social conscience and relationship with Gloster. That's also what I imagine Jackson will do so well.
Which Tom was it who had brambles stuck in him? Tom Hollander? Ouch.
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Post by wickedgrin on Feb 13, 2016 22:46:38 GMT
I would imagine that if Glenda thought it was essential for her interpretation of the role of Lear she would not flinch from being naked.
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Post by Jan on Feb 14, 2016 8:57:26 GMT
I would imagine that if Glenda thought it was essential for her interpretation of the role of Lear she would not flinch from being naked. Former Ken Russell film actress willing to appear nude ? You might be right. |
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Post by lynette on Feb 14, 2016 11:27:56 GMT
Aren't they meant to be Ancient Britons? They could all be nude throughout, with the woad washed off in the storm scene. Nope, sorry. The women at least need to wear clothes. Lear makes the point about them wearing gorgeous but flimsy evening wear when it is very cold. He is saying ' Reason not the need' meaning you don't have to need something ie his Knights, but you just want them for your status etc. Hence their fabulous but inadequate dresses. I've always wanted the gals to wear real cat walk stuff but the directors never get this and usually swathe them in furs! |
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Post by RedRose on Feb 14, 2016 15:33:26 GMT
A total gender swap would be very interesting!
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Post by crabtree on Feb 14, 2016 19:15:54 GMT
the Nigel Hawthorne Lear was interesting, with Michael Maloney, but the falling rocks were pretty terrifying and the genuine. centuries old Kimonos made Goneril and Regan immoveable.
But i'm thrilled to get the chance to see Glenda again.....
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Post by Jan on Feb 14, 2016 19:24:28 GMT
the Nigel Hawthorne Lear was interesting, with Michael Maloney, but the falling rocks were pretty terrifying and the genuine. centuries old Kimonos made Goneril and Regan immoveable. But i'm thrilled to get the chance to see Glenda again..... Hated the Hawthorne one, a new low with the Fool in that one. |
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Post by nash16 on Feb 14, 2016 22:50:38 GMT
the Nigel Hawthorne Lear was interesting, with Michael Maloney, but the falling rocks were pretty terrifying and the genuine. centuries old Kimonos made Goneril and Regan immoveable. But i'm thrilled to get the chance to see Glenda again..... Hated the Hawthorne one, a new low with the Fool in that one. Yes, wasn't the Fool in that one…a foreigner? Of "Japanese" extraction? #outraged |
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Post by Jan on Feb 15, 2016 7:09:52 GMT
Hated the Hawthorne one, a new low with the Fool in that one. Yes, wasn't the Fool in that one…a foreigner? Of "Japanese" extraction? #outraged Bit racist of you to say that. |
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Post by nash16 on Feb 15, 2016 9:52:17 GMT
Yes, wasn't the Fool in that one…a foreigner? Of "Japanese" extraction? #outraged Bit racist of you to say that. Ah, the point I was making... |
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Post by Jan on Feb 15, 2016 12:35:25 GMT
Bit racist of you to say that. Ah, the point I was making... Rather than report you to Admin let me explain why your post was offensive so you might learn something. I am well aware that you were charging me with racism. In this production the Fool was played by a Japanese actor. I said the Fool was bad in this production. You are saying that the reason I am saying this is that I am a racist, that is that there is no possible other reason for me to have taken the view, for example that the part was badly acted, or the director's interpretation of the part was ridiculous, or any number of valid reasons. To show up the stupidity of that view I should point out that I also thought Hawthorne was very poor in that production, do you think I'm saying that because he is English ? However, there is another implication from your comments, you must think that because the Fool was played by a Japanese actor then they should be above any normal criticism which might be directed at English actors. What they teach you in any diversity training course (you might try one) is that the assignment of a single characteristic to a single race or ethnic group is racist. That could be "All Mexicans are lazy" or "All Japanese are good actors" - the fact is that some are good, some are bad, some are average, they are all individuals just like us. Ponder upon that - equality means that they should be treated equally, no ? Of course also present in your post is a version of the tedious old political argument "Anyone who disagrees with me is Hitler" - the adolescent tendency to ascribe the worst possible motives to anyone who simply disagrees with one of your opinions. I have close family members who are immigrants to UK so the charge is doubly ridiculous. I don't expect an apology. |
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Post by lynette on Feb 15, 2016 14:57:15 GMT
The actor playing the fool wasn't v good. The whole show was poor, the rocks were really ludicrous and it was a terrible disappointment all round. What ever nationality the actors were is totally irrelevant. But they weren't v good. You can't get round that.
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