all the world's a house tour

live theatre is probably the most important thing in the world

imagine being banned from the globe theatre in 1606 for saying what kent did to king lear

what did he do to king lear

he fucked that old man

shuffling off this mortal coil does anyone want anything

i just finished the national theatre live's king lear (2018). really fucking good holy shit. edmund's actor was phenomenal. incredibly sympathetic to goneril and regan, and the modern dress felt actually intentional and every choice was deliberate. i felt fully sympathetic for almost every character which is exactly what a good lear production should do

possibly an unpopular opinion but king lear has one of the most potentially unsatisfying ending of the tragedies (that i've read). key word is "potentially" because while i don't think the ending itself is actually unsatisfying, it ends very quickly immediately following lear's death, especially because the last act has multiple characters' imminent deaths suspended for some time. kent's fate is ambiguous (hinting at suicide but not in any concrete way) while albany, edgar, and the entire rest of the kingdom are completely at a loss. the apocalypse is invoked multiple times but the world doesn't actually come to an end with lear's death; it just leaves the other characters devastated in its wake. there is some notion of a future at the end of every other tragedy but king lear ends with the survivors facing a complete blank. i think this also makes it the saddest ending of all the tragedies (again, that i've read) but from a technical standpoint i feel that it's quite difficult to stage this and not have the audience feel like it's come to an abrupt end.

like out of every single tragedy i've read i find it almost impossible to think of what could happen after the events of lear. we know too little about both edgar and albany (in the former case, his authentic real self) to say anything about them definitively. and kent is probably going to die. the survivors of every other tragedy have all had significant stage time (horatio and fortinbras, malcolm and macduff, antony, the capulets and montagues, iago and cassio, etc.) but none of the surviving characters of king lear are KNOWN to the audience. we can't even speculate without diverging significantly from the text/having to extrapolate their characters out of very little information. there's just this complete blank.

"i am a man more sinned against than sinning" being such a popular king lear quote is crazy because that's literally not true. his ass is lying

"as an actor you're allowed to choose different motivations to get you there and you don't need to necessarily tell the audience" don't worry mr hayden tee sir i Noticed in today's matinee i saw your chanel boots <3 i was able to see myself in your javert i understood exactly what you were doing thank you for your service

@lipstickhamlet

make that trio polyamorous

@lipstickhamlet

Regan my fucking GIRL. Regan King Lear my best friend. No one gets her like I do. Only woman in Shakespeare to straight up stab someone in the stage directions. Girlboss (stabbed a man) and girlfailure (got poisoned) in one. So powerful she inspires another woman to kill (her). Probably loves her husband, even. The aura. The prestige. My GIRL.

Regan my fucking GIRL. Regan King Lear my best friend. No one gets her like I do. Only woman in Shakespeare to straight up stab someone in the stage directions. Girlboss (stabbed a man) and girlfailure (got poisoned) in one. So powerful she inspires another woman to kill (her). Probably loves her husband, even. The aura. The prestige. My GIRL.