The True History of the Life and Death of King Lear and his Three Daughters

On a widely lit stage of bare pine boards and everyone in ordinary street wear, you need remarkable actors to grab our focus and somehow transport us elsewhere. 

Bob Cousins’ signature empty-space design at least had a line of metal chairs for them to pull out occasionally. And Eamon Flack has assembled a mostly outstanding if uneven cast, headed by the ever-authentic Colin Friels, his Lear first cursing furiously then pained, terrified at his impeding madness.

He’s an illusionary old fool dividing his kingdom between two daughters, and exiling his third for not declaring her love rapturously enough. Civic and private rot then spreads quickly, with family treachery and sibling murders, jealousy and treason.

Chaos reigns in this transitional, intergenerational world hanging between the old and the young. Flack argues that we are in a comparable interregnum of destruction today. Presumably, to get with the time, we need a modern production stripped bare of colour and place.

While lacking the imposing grandeur typical of Lear, Friels carries a benign love which is returned by those who follow the old king when he’s thrown to the winds. 

Peter Carroll’s veteran Fool never lets Lear out of his sight; Brandon McClelland’s trusty Kent is also rusted on, and Tom Conroy is inventive as Edgar, always a challenging role but, when “disguised” as mad Tom, also a figure of great love.  Alison Whyte is heart-rendering as Edgar’s blinded mother, the Countess of Gloucester. Ahunim Abebe as Cordelia returns at the end in the last sacrifice of love.

Of course it’s the bad guys who thrill most, especially the Iago-like bastard Edmund (a brilliant Raj Labade) and the nasty servant Oswald (an obsequious James Fraser). The sisters Goneril (Charlotte Friels) and Regan (Jana Zvendiuk) have almost enough forceful claws, and the ensemble also includes Charles Wu, Conor Merrigan-Turner and Sukhbir Singh Walia.

Costumes are by James Stibilj. The production is distinguished by striking musical punctuation, strings, percussion and humming just offstage from musicians Hilary Geddes, Jess Green and Arjunan Puveendran (also co-composer with sound designer Steve Francis).

Martin Portus

Photographer: Brett Boardman