It's all right, folks, the Stratford Festival isn't going whole-hog into classical music! It's just intriguing that on Saturday afternoon, for the second time in 24 hours, I was forcibly reminded of the famous opening chorus of Carmina Burana by Carl Orff while watching a play at Stratford. The text of that piece describes Fortune, Empress of the World, seated in the midst of her ever-turning wheel which elevates one person to the heights as it casts another down into the depths.
The first time I recalled it was at the performance of Chicago, when first Velma and then Roxie found that their starring moments of fame and notoriety were over and done as the press moved on to the next "big story."
Yesterday, it was Shakespeare's "history" of Richard III, and the words that came so strongly to my mind as Richard's fall from the throne ended with his death were the final lines of the chorus:
Nam sub axe legimus Hecubam reginam.
"For beneath the wheel we read that Hecuba is queen"
The reference is to the legendary queen of mighty Troy who ended her life as a slave of the Greeks.
With all of Shakespeare's history cycle, it is important to remember that each of these plays was written in part to curry favour with mighty Elizabeth Tudor by demonstrating the legitimacy of her claim to the throne, a claim still disputed to this day in some quarters. None, though, is so blatant a piece of political propaganda as Richard III, the first of the cycle to be completed.
To begin with, Shakespeare committed, as most (but not all) historians today will agree, what amounted to a complete slander of Richard's reputation by portraying him as an outright melodramatic villain of totally sleazy and sickeningly immoral behaviour. The play then ends with his death at the hands of Henry Tudor, Earl of Richmond, who accepts the crown as King Henry VII -- and who was Elizabeth's grandfather. His final panegyric to the peaceful and powerful future of England is as plain a forecast of her greatness as the Archbishop's final speech about her at her christening scene in the Bard's last history play, Henry VIII.
How, then, does Stratford justify producing such a piece of theatre with such dubious historical credentials? Simply put, Richard III is first-rate theatre, with a fascinating cast of characters which includes, unusually for Shakespeare's histories, some truly powerful parts for women. Yes, there are the usual assortment of largely interchangeable nobles and churchmen whose names would have meant far more to an Elizabethan audience than they do to us today. Overall, though, the story of Richard III does have a very theatrical outline -- a plot in which the Duke of Gloucester, with immense pride and ambition, schemes and manipulates in order to remove all rival claimants to the throne, in order to solidify his own claim.
To put it in terms of the symbolic figure of Fortune, Richard tried too hard to jog the lady's elbow and wring favour from her hands by force, and his downfall became all the more terrible when the wheel kept turning as it must. It's the classic fate of the tragically flawed hero, brought low by his own pride, but with the hero recast as the villain of the piece in an unusual reversal of the standard formula.
This year marks the 70th season of the Stratford Festival, and the Festival chose Richard III, which was the first of two plays in the inaugural 1953 season, to celebrate the long-delayed opening of the splendid new Tom Patterson Theatre. They've also celebrated the anniversary by indulging in a veritable cascade of luxury casting for this show.
Start with Colm Feore in the role of Richard himself. Feore, one of the most respected theatrical actors in Canada today, here gives one of the finest performances of his career. This is a role often played by a younger actor, as the historical Richard died when he was only 33. Despite being much older, Feore gives a most convincing portrayal of the energy of youth, combined with a heart-stopping assumption of the twisted and deformed physical shape which Shakespeare imposed upon the man. I wonder if Feore has to be thoroughly straightened out by backstage therapy after each performance?
Even more striking is the way that Feore so closely adheres to a hail-fellow-well-met tone as Richard, thoroughly disarming all critics with his geniality and winning the doubtful with his apparent sincerity, strongly tinged with self-mockery. This accords very well with the script, but I've never seen another actor make so much of it. The icy coldness which succeeds it in his private moments, and later in the play, is made doubly chilling as a result.
The luxury casting continues with the key women in the play. There are four key female roles in the play, and all were powerfully presented by some of Canadian classical theatre's brightest lights. Jessica B. Hill as Lady Anne gives a performance of iron strength in the scene in which Richard woos her over the casket of the dead King Henry VI (whom he murdered). Ideally, perhaps, we should see more signs of wavering in Hill before the moment when Lady Anne accepts Richard's suit.
Lucy Peacock appears as Queen Elizabeth, the wife (and then the widow) of Edward IV, Richard's oldest brother. Peacock here tames the querulous note sometimes apt to appear in her voice and gives a performance of strength and resolution, showing by far the most regal disposition of anyone on the stage. The scene in which she successfully withstands Richard's blandishments when he asks to marry her daughter becomes, in Peacock's hands, the climactic turning point of the entire drama.
The role of the formidable Queen Margaret, widow of Henry VI, comes to powerful life in the voice and presence of Seana McKenna. Margaret can easily become the most melodramatic element of the play, yet McKenna makes her an intimidating presence, a voice of fate not easily ignored as she curses one and all in enigmatic terms which the rest of the play brings to fulfilment. McKenna makes Margaret truly the personification of Fortune, Empress of the World, as she foresees and predicts the fates of all the others.
Finally, in opposition to Margaret, comes the ageing and world-weary Duchess of York, Richard's mother, played with a true air of fatigue by Diana Leblanc. Her most memorable moment comes at the point where she laments that she had ever given birth to Richard. The scene, late in the play, in which these women come together on stage, practically remakes them into a chorus of despair, a striking parallel to the classical Greek tragedy The Trojan Women.
Another striking role, that of Tyrrell who murders the young princes in the tower, is here taken unusually by a woman. Hilary McCormack presents a formidable ice block of a woman, determined and unswayed by any emotion as she undertakes Richard's commission to murder two children. It's a brief but none the less chilling character portrait.
Some very strong actors with certified star credentials at Stratford have taken on a number of the roles of royals and nobles in the play. Michael Blake gives a convincing portrayal of Richard's good-hearted older brother, the Duke of Clarence, who right to the last remains convinced that Richard would never turn against him. His very nature betrays him.
Wayne Best makes much of his brief appearance as the aged and sick King Edward IV, creating a powerful effect with his voice even as he is bedridden, in a scene which has the advantage of being played out on the stage's flexible balcony level.
Ben Carlson presents a signature clear-spoken performance as Lord William Hastings. David Collins came across equally clearly as Lord Stanley.
Among these multiple noble lords, pride of place definitely must be given to Andre Sills, whose Duke of Buckingham gave Feore a real run for his money as the dominating presence on the stage. Not that it's a competition between actors in the way it would have been in the 1800s or earlier, but I'm convinced that these two could have switched roles with equally powerful results.
Finally, late in the day, comes the Earl of Richmond, Henry Tudor. Jamie Mac presented the man in all his morally-upright-justice-crusader splendour, the final speech a stunning conclusion to the play (especially as underlined by Berthold Carriere's powerful arrangement of Hubert Parry's Jerusalem, a kind of unofficial second national anthem of England). It's worthwhile to add here that this portrait in Shakespeare's script is every bit as fraudulent as the portrayal of Richard.
Most of these actors also double up as walk-ons in the crowd scenes. Even with that doubling, this Richard III still requires a company of 35 actors.
Designer Francesca Callow has made ample use of light in her intriguing designs for this production. The balcony platform can be extended outwards to half the length of the stage, and this happens more than once. A long narrow central rectangle running for much of the stage floor's length could be illuminated from beneath by a pattern of stained-glass windows. From my seat near the stage end, I couldn't clearly discern if the intricate designs and figures of the "windows" made any comment on the action of the play, but it wouldn't surprise me if they did.
Also able to be illuminated, from within, were the pillars supporting the balcony, and a number of the set pieces which were wheeled on and off -- a dining table and chairs, the casket of Henry VI, the bed where the princes in the tower were murdered, and more. These set items were clearly not in period, being mostly simply Cubist in design. The internal lighting of these set pieces was universally cold and white.
A striking addition to the play, and strikingly played out behind white cotton draperies on which lights cast the shadows of figures within, was the opening sequence in which Richard's grave was discovered beneath a car park in Leicester in 2012. The draperies were used again, very powerfully, to partially conceal the climactic scene of the Battle of Bosworth Field and the death of Richard.
Costumes ranged from the detailed (the royal garb of Queen Elizabeth and of Edward IV or the robes and mitre of the Bishop of Ely) to the merely suggestive (the mourning clothes of the four royal women in the last act), while remaining clearly in period.
Michael Walton's lighting designs vividly created the worlds of the play, with precise area lighting. The most notable examples were the carefully judged mood lighting of the murder scenes and the dynamic and unsettling lighting of the final battle.
Director Antoni Cimolino, Artistic Director of Stratford, has here crafted an uncommonly clear Richard III, thoughtfully staged and with the script thoughtfully pruned to bring as much clarity as possible for an audience not familiar with all the details of the history which the play purports to present.
For the most part, Cimolino and company have avoided the twisting back and forth to face the audience on three sides which sometimes afflicts actors in this space (one or two scenes still suffered from it). Throughout the show, the stage pictures created both clarity and drama to enhance the vocal work of the actors. The entire show -- long as it is (just shy of 3 hours with 1 intermission) -- still moved along at a brisk clip from start to finish.
This Richard III is a worthy successor to all previous Stratford stagings of the play which I have seen, a memorably staged, designed, and performed production which has highlighted, in no uncertain terms, the greatest strengths of this company.
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A quick note about the brand-new Tom Patterson Theatre. As we all expected and hoped, this splendid new facility has retained the traditional sightlines and dimensions of its curling-rink predecessor of the same name, while enclosing the auditorium with the largest and most architecturally dramatic lobby spaces of any theatre I've ever seen in Canada (undersized lobbies are the bane of the Festival's other three theatres). It is, by any standards, a stunning achievement.
The technical standards of the new house are also vastly improved over the previous one.
Note to those buying tickets: in a 180-degree reversal of the old Tom Patterson Theatre, you now enter the auditorium at the top row and walk down the stairs to the lower rows.
Sadly, the beautiful and comfortable new seats are confined to spaces just as limited as their stacking chair ancestors in the curling rink. This means that the new theatre is just as cramped and uncomfortable as the old one for people with long legs, or people with knee or ankle problems. That became clear when I tried to stand up at the end of the 100-minute first act.
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