Photo by Dominic Maxwell
Even though we made our traditionally early arrival at the
Tobacco Factory to see Richard III, we were astonished to find the queue to get
into the theatre winding right out of the bar and down the stairs to the box
office, with the result that instead of getting a seat at the front with an
almost-part-of-the-cast view, my son and I found ourselves in the back row,
craning to see around one of the pillars.
‘Just because they found him under a car park!’ another
regular said to me, wearily.
And when he comes onto the stage to deliver his opening
soliloquy, Richard, Duke of Gloucester, (played by John Mackay) does indeed
resemble a skeleton. Tall and bony, with
cropped white hair and a white face blackened about the eyes, he starts the
play as he ends it – no flawed, flesh-and-blood hero brought down by overweening ambition, but the personification of depravity. Mackay’s Richard is the archetypal psychopath
who, devoid of empathy and conscience, murders as much to divert himself from
what he sees as the pointlessness of existence as to achieve the power he
craves, and often, horrifyingly, the audience finds itself laughing along with
him.
In a play that is dominated by its villain, the rest of the
cast put in sterling performances. I was
especially moved by Nicki Goldie’s portrayal of the Duchess of York, the only
character who truly knows Richard for what he is, having given birth to
him. But it is Richard who charms,
entertains, disgusts and mesmerises, often all at the same time, right up to
the end when he lies dead on Bosworth Field, his long limbs curled up in a way
that is fittingly reminiscent of a dead spider.
On the long trek back to the car, I found myself wondering whether Richard III might have availed himself of the nearby Aldi car park, were he still living, or would he have feared returning to find that his horse - assuming one had been procured for him - hobbled? I doubt we shall ever know the truth.
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