A challenging play, King Lear (1605/6), seen earlier this year in a much praised production at the Almeida, last year there was Kenneth Branagh’s. Usually coming in at over three hours, Branagh’s was a two-hour, interval-free pelt. And of course how can one forget Ian McKellen’s in 2018, and the many illustrious actors over the decades.
The Riverside Studios is hosting the UK première of Tang Shu Wing’s (Macbeth at the Globe in 2015) all-female, physical theatre, seventy-five-minute version. First seen in Hong Kong in 2021 and in Shanghai in 2023, it will tour to Romania and Berlin. Curiously, it seems much longer.
Hong Kong actress Cecilia Yip takes the volatile lead, and what a presence—all in white, white hair unraveling, stance martial arts. Not the first female, I might add, in that role. Kathryn Hunter was King Lear in Helena Kaut-Howson’s production at the Globe in 2022.
Hon-wai Yuen’s minimalist set (only two props, wooden chair and stepladders, together they make a viable throne) and costume design (Hon-wai Yuen and Jade Leung) are superlative. In 1962, Peter Brook apparently went for a spare, minimalist set. Anything and everything is possible with Shakespeare these days—coming shortly to this very theatre is Eddie Izzard’s one-man Hamlet.
I digress... Tonight’s King Lear is taut yet slow-paced. Too slow-paced for some—there are walkouts. Visually striking, sound design (Anthony Yeung, music composer Billy Ng) dramatic and loud (there is some screaming), movement vocabulary and mime limited and simple. Tsz-yan Yeung’s dark lighting, and red laser lights, completes the dramatic Gesamtkuntswerk.
But how well do you need to know Lear? There are nine characters on stage, some having to double: the Fool and Cordelia are one. Cassandra Tang makes a lively Fool, the most engaging and colourful personality of the evening, her cartwheels a delight. In beautiful designer costume as Cordelia, white as her father King Lear’s, they both stand out in shadow and silhouette.
The evil sisters, Regan and Goneril (Peggy Chow and Ting-kwan Lau), in glamorous black, dance an entitled ‘tango’ duet; Kent (Amanda Leung) is a discreet presence in his mask as he secretly shadows the king. Edmund and Edgar (Corina Druc and Costinela Ungureanu, who doubles as Cornwall) I confuse, even when they engage in a duel, until the masked ‘poor Tom’ section. Druc strides about as the duplicitous bastard Edmund, though it’s hard to make out who they are in the crepuscular light. Albany (Ki-yan Ko in business suit) seems peripheral. Lindzay Chow we know is Gloucester from the bloodied eyes.
Shakespeare’s plays lend themselves to infinite interpretations: ballet in particular (MacMillan’s Romeo and Juliet, and so on) has done well with Shakespeare. “As flies to wanton boys” are they to creative minds. To cultures with their own fabulous traditions—I’m thinking Peking Opera, and artistic director of Taiwan's Contemporary Legend Theatre Wu Hsing-kuo’s one-man King Lear. And Kurosawa’s film Ran.
The body, gestures and facial expression are especially valuable in crossing linguistic barriers. The Fool’s “Have more than thou showest, Speak less than thou knowest,” might describe tonight’s non-verbal theatre of gesture. Condensed, enigmatic, moody, attractive, it keeps me on my toes piecing it together. Better to sit back and let it wash over you in meditative trance. I have eighty-seven image shots of the production—how to select a suitable representative number is a dilemma in itself.