Ian McKellen’s King Lear
May 31st, 2007 by Debra Murphy
A good friend of my son’s is across the pond, as they say, studying abroad in London. As a theater major, she’s doing some exhaustive “homework” taking in a whole slew of London stage productions. Naked Harry Potter, for one (Daniel Radcliffe in Peter Shaffer’s Equus) to which Rachael reports that “he’s definitely growing up.”
A naked Harry Potter is not quite my cup of tea. The production she recently took in that made me seethe with jealousy, frothing at the mouth and nearly requiring medical attention, was Ian Mckellen’s King Lear. Some people say as a matter of speech that they’d “give their right arm” to see such-and-such a production. I would literally give my right pinkie finger, or at least half of it, to see Mckellen as Lear at the Royal Shakespeare Company. He’s that good.
So – one of this century’s foremost interpreters of Shakespeare is currently on stage in London in a career-crowning performance as Lear, the Mt. Everest of acting challenges, and I’m over here in Oregon. That’s great.
ACHHH!!! Somebody put money in my purse! (And I’ll send you half my pinkie finger.)
Note that John’s friend is ALSO seeing (just to add insult to injury), Ian Mckellen in Chekhov’s The Seagull.
My my, Sir Ian seems to be leading more than one of us into temptation! For me, it’s not self-mutilation I’m contemplating, but (as I clearly warned Rachael before she left) Murder.
“Hand over those plane and theatre tickets, or you DIE!” were my exact words, I believe. Well, she didn’t heed my Dire Warnings, and has even FLAUNTED her direst cruelty by sending us these gloating pictures! I will savor my Revenge…I don’t know yet what it will be, but it will be the Terror of the World!