John Lithgow                 photos by Joan Marcus

                                                  by Eugene Paul

After forty-one years, the Public Theater has brought a new production of King Lear to the Delacorte, crystal clear in its exposition, sweeping in its physical scope, aggravatingly complex as ever in it character development of Lear, ham handed in its painting of villains, and far from clever in Shakespeare’s almost ritually employment of devices he has used over and over, play to play, in planting his plots.  He may have had to resort to them so frequently four hundred years ago but here we are today, credulity strained but forgiving, on our part, because of dear old Shakespeare, the greatest of them all. Somehow, it’s Lear that has become the pinnacle of the canon, with the hoary pundits and professors ranging on both sides: the greatest play but un-actable, the greatest play because it’s so very actable.  And all of New York fighting to get in to see the result.

Scenic magician John Le Beatty has created a brutally forthright set holding together the enormous stretch of stage which is nevertheless full of visual – and auditory! –surprises as the play flows, castle to palace to heath to hovel replete with famous storms (Acme Sound Partners) that beat around the unbowed, half-mad head of Lear, stripped of his royal entitlements. On the other hand, Susan Hilferty’s costumes are confusing raiment for this unidentified time and place, but maybe that’s on purpose. In the long and frightening journey of Lear from King to mad, half-naked outcast, Director Daniel Sullivan gets right to the point laying out the stories:  Lear’s egregious folly, Gloucester’s wounding gullibility.  In this he leans heavily on the excellent electronic sound technicians to transmit flawlessly every precious word to all reaches of the huge theater or chaos ensues.

Jessica Hecht and Annette Bening 

Lear (splendid John Lithgow) has decided that, ripe with years, he will divide his kingdom among his three daughters, Goneril (Annette Bening), wife to the Duke of Albany (Christopher Innvar), Regan (Jessica Hecht) married to the Duke of Cornwall (Glenn Fleshler) and his favorite, Cordelia (lovely Jessica Collins) who marries the King of France (Slate Holmgren).  Lear will give the greater portion to whichever daughter professes her love for him best and most, which is childlike in its hubristic simplicity and hardly a manifestation of wisdom, especially for a king.  Lear’s plan is simply to live happily ever after, going from one daughter’s household to the next as a beloved parent and patron, no responsibilities, please, in an endless tour of pleasure for him and his regal retinue, although no longer a king.  Goneril and Regan outdo themselves in transparent flattery; Cordelia does not, professing her love no greater than it has always been, which is witty but unwise under the circumstances.  Volatile Lear instantly disinherits her, divides her portion between his other daughters and banishes Cordelia and anyone who sides with her.  The stage is set.  You think.

Steven Boyer, Jay O. Sanders, John Lithgow, and Chukwudi Iwuji  

Immediately enacted is the subplot: the Earl of Gloucester (Clarke Peters), follower of Lear, has two sons, Edgar (excellent Chukwudi Iwuji) his heir, and significantly, Edmund (Eric Sheffer Stevens) his too clever bastard son, who becomes the driving force getting rid of his brother, who sets Goneril and Regan against each other, who captures Cordelia and Lear and sentences them to death.  It takes Shakespeare many machinations of embarrassingly asinine maneuvers, bald lies, turncoats, rescues, endless portentous letters, a seething panorama of one damn thing after another to rumble through the machinery of the play to its tragic end, an ending so unpopular it was changed to “happy” for 150 years before wiser heads prevailed.

Now, Lear runs his tragic course and on the way has challenged to their utmost great actors as the Shakespearean pinnacle to surmount, once reserved for Hamlet.  John Lithgow, one of our eminent stars displays a range he’s never shown before.  It’s an achievement to rank among the finest, veering wildly from childlike to magisterial and all of it ringing true, to beyond admiration: we are moved. Chukwudi Iwudji as disguised “Poor Tom’”, another   fool-madman in Lear’s storm, actually Edgar hiding from his homicidal brother, Edmund, give a touching, electrifying performance.  Steven Boyer as Lear’s Fool is greatly affecting.  But the gamut of players required to stage the tragedy of King Lear as epic demands more than merely adequate stage work; each actor has to be a Lear in stature, in quality, to pull us all in. King Lear is more than a solitary star turn if it is to move us fully in this vulnerable time when an aging population finds troubling expression in Lear’s own dilemmas. Director Sullivan knows all this, has made his choice: clarity foremost. And clarity is handsomely served. Withal, this is a King Lear to be reckoned with.

Delacorte Theater, the free public theater in Central Park. 8 pm. Tickets available daily at noon at the box office. Three hours.