King Lear at Bard on the Beach

The line up for Bard on the Beach this year is fantastic, and because I read all of the plays this year, I bought season tickets. The plays are King Lear and Twelfth Night on the main stages, as well as Titus Andronicus and The Tempest on the studio stages.

Yesterday I went to King Lear, which was the first of my tickets and to be honest, the one that I was least excited for. King Lear is probably the most tragic of Shakespeare's plays for a couple of reasons. For one, the plot is unreal - King Lear banishes his favorite daughter (the only one who isn't evil), goes insane, watches his corrupt daughters turn on each other, watches all three of his daughters die, and then dies of a broken heart himself. Sorry for spoiling that, but if you haven't read it after 400 years, I'm not going to tip-toe around it. Secondly, when Shakespeare wrote the play, he adapted it from a similar storyline - but in the original, things look like they're going to fall apart but work out in the end. Original audiences went into the Globe expecting reconciliation and were slapped in the face with disaster - they weren't prepared for it at all. I guess it would sort of be like watching Forest Gump and instead of the great ending, some serial killer comes out of the woods and bludgeons everyone to death.

Last night's rendition was a pleasant suprise. I didn't read anything about the production before I got to Vanier Park, and I'm glad I didn't. For one, the play was set in modern times with a very minimalistic stage - the only props were Lear's wheelchair and a vacuum cleaner. I thought that was great because one of the main themes of the play is "nothing," or "no thing" - yes, it's symbolism for how women have no "things." Cute, Shakespeare. So needless to say, I loved the way they played with the theme in a material way. Also, they emphasized the comedic elements of the play - Shakespeare is famous for combining comedy with his tragedy, tragedy with his comedy, etc., and because the original production seemed like it was going to end well until it didn't, I thought it was cool that they put in so much humour last night.

One of the highlights for me was the music - there was a girl who did percussion (a funny xylophone, cymbals, bongo drums, etc.), a guy who played upright bass, and on occasion, members of the cast rocked out with their accoustic guitars when everyone on stage sang. When I read Lear, I never really focused on the funny little ditties, but the production brought them to life and gave everything a very tropical feel. That was really awesome considering behind the set, the tent curtains were drawn, giving everyone an amazing view of the bay and Sunset Beach across the water. Let me tell you, watching Shakespeare, the ocean, and the sun go down as you listen to sweet beachy music will remove all doubt in your mind as to why you're living in Vancouver.

What really pulled the play together, however, was the performance of Christopher Gaze as King Lear. He's also the Artisitc Director of Bard, and his talent totally shines - everything from his posture to his speech to the way he conveyed emotions even if it was only through his eyes was perfectly done, especially considering Gaze is probably in his 40s or 50s, and Lear is elderly.



So, hopefully after all of my gushing, you're frantically looking for ways to get your hands on tickets. They're $33 and you can buy them from bardonthebeach.org.

King Lear was probably the best play I've seen in my whole life (which is actually saying a lot. I've seen about a dozen in the past couple of years, and they included Jesus Christ Superstar and The Diary of Anne Frank) and considering it was my least favorite of the four to read, I am now almost ecstatic to see Twelfth Night (set in the 1920s with a Hollywood feel), The Tempest (my favorite play ever! I'm going for my birthday, and it's set in the seventeenth century with a string quartet), and Titus Andronicus (which also has a modern setting, as well as a parental advisory. It's awesome).


Please go. I'll love you more.