RICHARD III –The One With the Hump!

I’ll admit from the outset that this is one of my favourite Shakespeare plays, and one I know it quite well, having made and performed a condensed version of it some years ago. In that version, I played Richard as a kind of puppeteer –the other characters represented by pictures, dolls etc. Re-reading the play, I am again struck by how much of a manipulator or puppet-master Richard is –and by how absolutely his character dominates the play. Though many of the other characters are finely drawn by Shakespeare, they are doomed to be mere marionettes; their strings being pulled by Richard exactly as he want, and we never really get under the skin of any of them to anywhere near the same degree that we do Richard. And unlike many of the other historical plays, that have numerous sub-plots and intrigues and battles of wills, here it is really ALL about Richard and what he wants. He dominates and drives the story so absolutely, and in such a horrifically charming way, that one is hardly aware of the relative simplicity of the play’s plot. Yet it is brilliant theatre, and a brilliant study of power and intrigue. It is all about what Richard wants, and how he goes about getting it. And the great thing is that right from the start he is so honest in telling us what he is about to do –he charms the audience (or reader) as much as he charms those who he manipulates on order to attain his goals. And he is a great convincer –the wooing of Lady Anne is the most audacious wooing scene in the history of drama, yet it is contrasted by the failure of others to be equally convincing: witness Clarence’s failure to convince the men sent to kill him of sparing him –even though one of them is reluctant to go through with it. Or Buckingham’s untimely request for his reward. In this story, things are done one way: Richard’s way!

I read the play primarily as a series of ”set pieces” –the above-mentioned scenes being prime examples. Shakespeare must have hugely enjoyed writing it, because no scene seems at all forced or heavy –the lines burst from the page, and he would have known that the audiences would be expecting something extraordinary when it came to presenting such a notorious king. Baddies are always intriguing, but no other baddie in Shakespeare comes close to Richard. Or is half as fascinating. Personally, I find the most intriguing and illuminating part of the play to be the dream sequence in the last act: This has a naked rawness about it that reveals much more about the character of Richard than we have seen before –it is a man of action suddenly introspective –seeing himself for what he is. It has a very modern edge to it, and this was the part of the play I most enjoyed working on and performing when I did my condensed version. Shakespeare brilliantly puts this BEFORE the battle, so that when he starts fighting we have already seen the depths of his soul, so there is something quite pathetic about his demise, with those most famous of famous lines: ”A horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse!”. Other than this the actual battle sequence as written is a bit of a let-down – it’s dispensed with in a mere few lines, and is far inferior to the battle scenes of some of the other history plays. It could be Shakespeare just wanting to round the story quickly (after four very long acts), but its low-keyness may be intentional: the build up to the battle is of far more concern and interest, in the same way that the fight to GET the crown is far more important than having it. Richard has nowhere to go once his goals are achieved. When I played Richard in my condensed version I chose to show this by having him literally deflate like a balloon –the final ”s” of his final ”horse” became the hiss of air escaping from a balloon as he crumpleed to the ground.
The discovery of Richard’s body a few years ago, and the campaign to prove that he was NOT the despotic, villainous king that Shakespeare created, has meant that Richard continues to intrigue us. I think whatever one’s view of the historical king, one can still enjoy the Richard of the play as a masterly creation.

I could write so much more about this play, but will save some points for my reviews of the three film versions I have been watching. One final thing though that I really, really like about this play is the way Shakespeare gives some of his most beautiful lines ever to the murderer of the young princes –the description of their death could so easily have been written in a direct, shocking or coarse way, but Shakespeare bravely makes the choice to go another way, and the passage is made all the more memorable for it. This is the work of a genius.

Favourite Line:

Richard:
My conscience hath a thousand several tongues,
And every tongue brings in a several tale,
And every tale condemns me for a villain.
(Act V, Sc.3)

Character I would most like to play: Richard (of course, of course .. !)