What happens when Richard III, who has been portrayed by Ian McKellen as a fascist, Laurence Olivier as a camp seductive villain with limp, various actors in leather with devices suggesting disability, is played by an actor in a wheelchair? Well, the false symbolism about the hunchback king as cockatrice, in other words evil within and without, disappears. You have a very good actor, Michael Patrick, portraying the Machiavellian Yorkist as someone who chooses to seize the crown, a gesture of defiance in the face of increasing weakness.
The production burst into life at the Lyric Theatre with a rough and ready scene involving a bouncy castle and the Duke of Clarence in angelic wings. So far, so cinematic. There was a mini-history lesson beforehand, then out came the lines “Now is the winter of our discontent/Made glorious summer by this son of York…with its pun and the Duke protesting too much. He came across as almost reasonable, resonant vocally, and commanding. The play has been adapted by Patrick and his writing partner Oisin Kearney. They adjusted the line about Richard emerging ‘deformed, unfinished and sent before his time’ into ‘deformed, finished sent out of this breathing world before my time’ to emphasize that Michael Patrick has become disabled via MND rather than being born with disability.
The long first half mostly flew by with some very strong passages. These included Ciaran O Brien’s scene as Clarence about to die in the butt of malmsey. Any scene with Paula Clarke’s terrifying Tyrrell the assassin, which this was, worked well. She used sign language, and despatched people with a sociopath’s smile. Often in a massive plastic waste bin that was wheeled about. Richard’s wooing of widowed Queen Anne, which he’d engineered, also had power. From then on, it was murder, creative mayhem and nice use of lighting and sound effects.
It’s a mad world inhabited by the Duke of Gloucester, full of betrayal but also humour. The laughter quotient was high in response to lines about Richard’s intentions, even the savage ones. Hastings’ betrayal was cruel, and well executed, as was he. Michael Curran Dorsano acted the credulous lord believably.
Richard’s journey towards the crown involves depriving his mother, the formidable Duchess of York, of sons and grandchildren. Allison Harding’s natural authority in the role, and way with Shakespeare’s lines, was impressive, her leave taking of her son with a dismissive kiss memorable.
In the second half, things go wrong, badly wrong as Buckingham is discarded – brilliantly acted by Patrick McBrearty - and Richmond gathers an army in France. Ghaliah Conroy, who doubled as Queen Anne,came across as a convincing challenger to the wobbly throne. The scenes of conflict, maybe a tad over long, made great use of minimal effects and cast with shields pelted with plastic bottles, figures careening into each other. For this production, directed by Oisin Kearney, is set then and now. At one point, the King is given a photo shoot while in self-congratulatory mood. Later, we see the monarch stripped, vulnerable, a man who’s overstretched himself. There is a line that recalls Macbeth, about being steeped in blood and the endings of the two tragedies chime.
Yet after Richard III has uttered his famous line in Shakespeare, about being willing to sacrifice his kingdom for a horse, he dies. It’s Henry VII’s chance. In this production Richard or Michael Patrick had the last word, in humorous T-shirt. This was a new tragedy, bold, ambitious, worthy of the name.
Jane Hardy
Richard III continues at The Lyric Theatre until November 10.
