King Lear by William Shakespeare.
Directed by Neil Armfield. Set Design Robert Cousins. Costume Designer Alice Babidge.
Lighting Nick Schlieper. Composer John Rodgers with Simon Barker and Phillip
Slater. Sound Designer Stefan Gregory. The Roslyn Packer Theatre. Sydney
Theatre Company and Colonial First State
Global Asset Management. November 28 2015 – January 9 2016
Reviewer Peter Wilkins
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| Geoffrey Rush as King Lear in Neil Armfield's production for Sydney Theatre Company Photography by Heidrun Loehr |
Shakespeare’s King Lear opens with the divestment of his
kingdom, the abrogation of his regal responsibility and the wilful banishment
of his most beloved daughter. It is the
catalyst to consequence most
catastrophic, the tragic decline of the noble hero, the essential flaw of the
Aristotelian tragic figure. It is therefore a damning indictment of flawed
reason, of family dysfunction, ruthless ambition, blind vanity and naked
exposure to human failing.
Neil Armfield’s vision for the
Sydney Theatre Company is bold, bare and resolute. It is raw in its humanity,
mighty in its minimalism and magnificent in the clarity of its intent. Shakespeare’s text on an open stage
reverberates with irony and stark antithesis, - the loyalty of Lear’s faithful Earl of Kent (Jacek
Koman) and the treachery of daughters
Regan, (Helen Thomson) and Goneril (Helen Buday); the wise utterances of The Fool (Robyn Nevin)
and the vexatious outbursts of the foolish old man, his King (Geoffrey Rush);
the honest love of Cordelia (Eryn Jean Norvill) and the false
love of Gloucester’s bastard son, Edmund (Meyne Wyatt).
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| Geoffrey Rush as King Lear and Eryn Jean Norvill as Cordelia Photography by Heidrun Loehr |
On Armfield’s wild and wet heath
in a brilliant exposure of staging on the Roslyn Packer stage, the feigned
madness of the Earl of Gloucester’s legitimate and loyal son Edgar (Mark
Leonard Winter), naked before the elements is confronted by The Fool’s ironic
observances of Life’s absurdity, the shifting landscape of the mind of a King
cast out and teetering upon the precarious precipice of reason and confusion.
It is a scene of overwhelming symbolism, fiercely purgatory in its assault, stunningly
unequivocal in its revelatory significance. It offers a stunning contrast to the second half
setting of Robert Cousins’ panoramic design. Epic in concept and visually
striking in its intentional contrast, Cousins’ design, under Nick Schlieper’s uninhibited
lighting design, provides a vast landscape of changing passions and conflicting
motives. From the Happy Birthday
celebration at the commencement of the play and introduced by The Fool in the
guise of Marilyn Monroe at Kennedy’s birthday celebration to the expansive
cleansing whiteness of the cliffs of Dover as Edgar leads his blind father Earl
of Gloucester (Max Cullen) toward the
imagined cliff’s edge, the open stage is a Pandora’s box of human vice, folly
and virtue. At times amplified dialogue in the vastness of the open space
becomes muffled and indistinct. Nevin’s swift punchlines, often accompanied by
awkward accompaniment from musician Simon Barker in the Gallery box become
lost. Cullen’s Gloucester too often loses words and the driving momentum of the
gripping production and intense performances from the cast sacrificed
significant text at the matinee.
The parallel plots that traverse
Lear’s loss of reason and possible descent into fearful moments of madness are
planets spinning about Shakespeare’s brilliantly shining Sun, the story of King
Lear, his abrogation and tragic decline. I have seen great actors of our Time
tackle this gargantuan role on stage and screen. Among them, Laurence Olivier
in the tormented grip of veering confusion between clear reason and clouded
madness, Paul Schofield in Peter Brook’s icy cold and snow bound landscape,
Robert Stephens on Stratford’s Memorial Theatre stage at Stratford upon Avon,
John Bell in Barrie Kosky’s idiosyncratic production in Canberra’s Playhouse
and Ian Holm in the intimate Cottesloe Theatre of the England’s National
Theatre. Geoffrey Rush in Neil Armfield’s logically inspired production is
magnificent as a king “more sinned against than sinning”. His Lear is intensely
human from his bitter and vexatious “ Better thou hadst not been born Than not to have pleased me better” to his heart wrenching howl as he enters with
the dead Cordelia in his arms” we see a man wearing the guise not of a king,
but possessed by the follies of the ordinary man. We see his impulsive flashes of blind vanity,
his gutted remorse, his awakened reason and his flashes of madness. Some say Rush’s Lear lacks gravitas. I say
that he holds the mirror up to Nature and through his purgation discovers truth
beyond the madness of existence. It is no accident that tears stream from the
audience’s face as Lear holds the glass to Cordelia’s mouth and gently breathes
his last. Rush is a great Lear, because he grasps the true mettle of his king’s
authentic humanity, his foolish acts and wise understandings, too late perhaps,
but in good time to find respite in the grave.
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| Helen Thomson as Regan. Geoffrey Rush as King Lear. Robyn Nevin as The Fool Colin Moddy and Nick Masters in the background. Photo: Heidrun Loehr |
Rush’s Lear finds good company in
a cast carefully directed by Armfield’s sure and vividly theatrical directorial
hand. Robyn Nevin’s Fool is the epitome of the wise comic, subtly admonishing
with ambiguous wit. Nevin’s chameleon-like versatility conjures a character ,
so convincing in his down to earth, no nonsense, common sense clown. Mark
Leonard Winter’s Mad Tom upon the blasted heath strips poor Edgar to Nature’s
essential rawness in his feigned madness to survive.
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| Max Cullen as Earl of Gloucester and Geoffrey Rush as King Lear Photo by Heidrun Loehr |
Only Max Cullen’s Gloucester is
lost in the shadows. The scene at Dover affords him some measure of empathy,
but incoherent diction and with his
character somewhat diminished by the large open stage,the parallel subplot of
Gloucester’s foolish gullibility pales somewhat in stature.
This Lear will linger for a very
long time. Armfield’s touches of theatrical genius, such as the use of black
makeup to depict death and the final assembly of the dead upon the stage, the
visual and sensory intensity and realism of the drenched scene upon the heath
and Nick Schlieper’s lighting of the second half of the play,
bathing the stage in white, highlighting the representational symbolism of the
piece and the cleansing power of just absolution for crime and flawed nature
are powerful depictions of Shakespeare’s themes of Love, Time and Death.
I am told that tickets to this
production can not be had for love or money. That is not surprising. This is a
Lear that will last long in the memories of audiences who have seen it, not
only because it is a powerful story about a foolish king, but because it is the
moral tale of all humanity as told by outstanding actors of our time under Neil
Armfield’s imaginative, inventive and intellectually enlightened direction . Don’t give up hope. Keep trying for that
available ticket or pray that Rush’s moving and powerfully human performance may find its way to
the screen. Sydney Theatre Company’s King
Lear merits such longevity.
