Comments | maverickseraph: The Duke of Albany

maverickseraph

The Duke of Albany

Mar 19, 2006 13:20

The Duke of Albany does some strange things. If "King Lear" was a threeday, I hope I would have played him better than he is written:

he announces his allegiance to the King openly in front of Goneril, giving her time to go to her boyfriend and ask him to kill Albany.
he completely drops the ball and forgets about the captured Lear and Cordelia.
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Comments 8

firstfrost March 19 2006, 20:06:31 UTC

We had the theory that the Fool doesn't end up down and out - the King of France gets killed or captured in the failed invasion, and the Fool heads for France to impersonate the King of France and take over. That's why you don't see him at all at the end.

aerynne March 19 2006, 21:36:10 UTC

The king of France actually has to go back to France; he leaves Cordelia and his army behind to finish the job. See IV.iii., "Something he left imperfect in the state, which since his coming forth is thought of, which imports to the kingdom so much fear and danger that his personal return was most required and
necessary." No idea if this got cut in our version, but there's actually a reason you never see him again.

I think it's really neat that Cordelia and the Fool were probably played by the same boy actor.

maverickseraph March 20 2006, 02:23:07 UTC

Yeah, France is never actually in jeapordy. Just his hot bride. :)

dolphin949 March 19 2006, 20:10:25 UTC

yeah, i think it weird that a woman is supposed to be named edmond...but hey, marc wanted the women to be women.

firstfrost March 19 2006, 20:57:56 UTC

It did give a more suggestive interpretation to "Follow me; thou shalt serve me: if I like thee no worse after dinner, I will not part from thee yet."
:)

aerynne March 19 2006, 21:41:35 UTC

Like it wouldn't be weirder for me to be wandering around crosscast in that particular part. I don't make a very convincing guy.

It is weird for some of it, and I could not for the life of me remember for the first two or three weeks of rehearsal that I was playing a *girl*, dammit. It is much more fun for me to be female, though. Also, I have seen girls named weirder things.

firstfrost March 19 2006, 23:56:52 UTC

In the Edmund case, it seems like it trades off unconvincing visuals for unconvincing plot/genre. Doing something like transposing the plot into the present day and making it corporate politics (like the Ethan Hawke Hamlet) would have let lesbian seduction scenes work better for me; as it was, things were played otherwise fairly canonically, so it felt weird. Other people's mileage no doubt varies. :)

Thread 5