| Folio version (F1) 1623 | more nihilistic: no justice, e.g. no mock trial |
| 1962 RSC (dir. Peter Brook) | austerity, pain, brute instincts: cuts Edmund’s redemption and servant’s intervention |
| 1971 King Lear film (dir. Peter Brook) | bleak winter landscape, rarely visible sun, nihilistic, inspired by Jan Kott, epic tragedy |
| Nahum Tate 1681 | re-write of play with happy ending: Cordelia and Edgar marry, Gloucester and Lear happily survive |
| 1983 King Lear TV (dir. Michael Elliot) | redemptive vision, very moving reconciliation between Lear and Cordelia |
| King George III (1810-20) | performances suspended as the play was too personal under derangement of ___ |
| 1971 Korol Lir film | Fool survives beyond Act III – timeless figure beyond ruling class games |
| 1983 King Lear TV (dir. Michael Elliot) | The Fool speaks to Lear from behind is throne (nagging conscience) |
| 1983 King Lear TV (dir. Michael Elliot) | Lear howls like a wounded animal when carrying Cordelia’s body – man reeling back to beast |
| 2014 National Theatre (dir. Sam Mendes) | emphasises madness – mad Lear imagines Fool to be Goneril and beats him to death |
| 1971 Korol Lir film | emphasises rulers’ disconnection from masses: cast of thousands, Lear imperious and god-like |
| 1998 National Theatre (dir. Richard Eyre) | Lear angry and impetuous, red stage with characters in black, colours pale as Lear becomes less powerful |
| 2007 RSC (dir. Trevor Nunn): | Lear initially bathed in light (Emperor) |
| 2009 Young Vic (dir. Rupert Goold) | Lear’s abdication is a party, Love Test is a means of humiliating daughters |
| 2013 (dir. Michael Attenborough) | Lear played as a villain (incest): abuse of power at all levels, political and familial |
| 2014 National Theatre (dir. Sam Mendes) | Stalinist regime (totalitarian Lear) |
| 1971 Korol Lir film | Cordelia presented as an angel of mercy |
| 1995 (dir. Jude Kelly) | Regan deranged after Cornwall’s death (keeps his corpse to look at it) |
| 2007 RSC (dir. Trevor Nunn) | Cordelia strong-minded rather than angelic, Goneril angry yet vulnerable, Regan is a submissive wife/daughter who sadistically delights in treatment of Kent + Gloucester |
| 2009 Young Vic (dir. Rupert Goold) | Goneril pregnant (disturbing Lear curses) and is justifiably angry (Lear’s men are hooligans) |
| 2009 Young Vic (dir. Rupert Goold) | gruesome blinding of Gloucester: Cornwall stamps out eye, Reagan seductively pushes long nail in then bites it out) |
| 2009 Young Vic (dir. Rupert Goold) | explicitly sexual relationship between Edmund and Goneril |
| 2009 Young Vic (dir. Rupert Goold) | Cordelia returns in white – messiah figure |
| 2013 (dir. Michael Attenborough) | insinuates Goneril and Regan had been sexually abused, and Cordelia being groomed as his next victim |
| 1982 RSC (dir. Adrian Noble) | implies dependent classes have always been treated poorly by ruling classes – political inadequacy manifests itself as destruction |
| 1993 RSC (dir. Adrian Noble) | map of Britain getting scuffed and ripped to show disintegration of Kingdom |
| 2013 (dir. Angus Jackson) | wooden slats being ripped away, torn away completely in storm scene |
| Nahum Tate 1681 | cut Edmund’s redemption and only called him ‘bastard’ |
King Lear Productions
July 17, 2019