This is a video production of a recent Royal Shakespeare Company performance of the play. I had heard about it because a friend of mine was living in London once (a little jealous) and told me that she had gone to see a performance of King Lear in which Ian MacKellan played the lead role (very jealous). So, when I discovered that this video was available on Amazon I bought it immediately. Generally I have not appreciated many of the play to television performances, especially the old BBC releases because they tend to take a very minimalist approach. While I find the minimalist approach on stage to be very good (most Shakespeare productions that I have seen to date have all taken the minimalist approach to scenery, but they also spend a lot of detail on the costumes). When it comes to movies based on Shakespearian plays, I do tend to prefer better scenery.
It is difficult to determine the period that Nunn has set his version of the play, though the costumes tend to suggest early 20th century, though my understanding of Shakespeare is that the period is generally timeless. Normally when plays were performing, contemporary costumes were used, however I have noticed that a lot of the movies (and plays) these days tend to have a period set at least prior to World War II. Obviously in Shakespeare's time there were no guns so there generally is no reference to firearms, however many of the plays at the time are very minimalistic on the description front, and only very important actions are mentioned. It is interesting to compare a written form of a play by Shakespeare, which would have minimal directions, to say Bernard Shaw, who extravagantly describes the scenery in his plays.
This time watching through Lear what I noticed was how Edmund is manipulating the situation to his own advantage. He is a bastard and thus has no entitlement of anything, but through his scheming and intrigue, he carefully removes everybody that could be a threat to his rise to power, and then brings himself close to both of the sisters (which would raise him to the position of king). King Lear is also a very bleak play, one in which the ending has the stage floor littered with bodies. In a normal Hollywood production, the invasion by the French would have been successful, in that we understand that Cordellia and the King of France are good people, where are the other sisters and Edmund are scheming manipulators. However, they do not win, they lose, and further, they are also imprisoned. It is only when Edgar finally confronts his wicked half-brother that they are freed, but by that time it is already too late. Both Goneril and Regan are dead, and Cordelia has been hung. To be honest, rewriting the ending so that Cordelia survives, to me, completely destroys the play.
It is difficult to determine the period that Nunn has set his version of the play, though the costumes tend to suggest early 20th century, though my understanding of Shakespeare is that the period is generally timeless. Normally when plays were performing, contemporary costumes were used, however I have noticed that a lot of the movies (and plays) these days tend to have a period set at least prior to World War II. Obviously in Shakespeare's time there were no guns so there generally is no reference to firearms, however many of the plays at the time are very minimalistic on the description front, and only very important actions are mentioned. It is interesting to compare a written form of a play by Shakespeare, which would have minimal directions, to say Bernard Shaw, who extravagantly describes the scenery in his plays.
This time watching through Lear what I noticed was how Edmund is manipulating the situation to his own advantage. He is a bastard and thus has no entitlement of anything, but through his scheming and intrigue, he carefully removes everybody that could be a threat to his rise to power, and then brings himself close to both of the sisters (which would raise him to the position of king). King Lear is also a very bleak play, one in which the ending has the stage floor littered with bodies. In a normal Hollywood production, the invasion by the French would have been successful, in that we understand that Cordellia and the King of France are good people, where are the other sisters and Edmund are scheming manipulators. However, they do not win, they lose, and further, they are also imprisoned. It is only when Edgar finally confronts his wicked half-brother that they are freed, but by that time it is already too late. Both Goneril and Regan are dead, and Cordelia has been hung. To be honest, rewriting the ending so that Cordelia survives, to me, completely destroys the play.