King Lear is profound and merciless

Many actors attempt to scale the mountain of King Lear. It is the quintessential hoop through which every first-rate actor jumps.

Although the crag is getting quite full, John Wright is the latest actor to leave his imprint in a striking performance for Freewill Shakespeare Festival.

King Lear is basically two stories – that of an old man outmanoeuvred by his daughters and of a brother betraying both father and brother.

Director Jim Guedo’s solid production, set around a contemporary gun-metal grey fortress, introduces Lear as a vain, capricious and testy old duffer with just enough rage to terrify. From the first scene, we see power and presence in his character.

Wright’s Lear is more than a mere king. He has the personal authority that people admire and respect. But he also embodies a powerful physical strength.

When he confers his lands to daughters Goneril and Regan during a cocktail party, his loyal courtier – the Earl of Kent – objects. Lear pushes Kent to the ground and banishes him for insolence.

In his arrogance, Lear hands over his lands and responsibilities while desperately holding onto power. And he loses everything.

In a backdrop of court intrigue, political backstabbing and imminent war, Guedo focuses on family dysfunction that ends with a pile of bodies littered across the stage.

Wright’s Lear suffers a gradual disintegration from a commanding presence in charge of a realm to a broken-hearted, feeble elder pushed around in a wheelchair. In perfectly calibrated descent into madness, he journeys from arrogance to anger to despair and finally to a spiritual understanding.

Although some productions require Lear to be near naked during the storm scene, a physical representation of his emotional anguish, Guedo’s production keeps Lear fully clothed. With no distractions, Wright digs deep into Lear’s soul and unmasks a frightened old man adrift in the universe.

But in coming out of the thunder and rain, Wright reveals a fresh side of the stooped Lear. In his new state of understanding, he is a father capable of love and tenderness for Cordelia, the daughter he mistakenly believed was too proud to proclaim her love for him. And it is this Lear that touches us most.

In the final scene, with a stone-cold Cordelia in his arms, Lear plumbs the depth of grief. By capitulating to despair and insanity, Lear finally understands the truth of his life.

The two “dog-hearted” daughters, the masterly Goneril (Annette Loiselle) and sexy Regan (Belinda Cornish) are a pox on the kingdom. Both Loiselle and Cornish delightfully play out the toxic monsters in a noxious case of the abuse of power.

But Kristi Hansen’s Cordelia, the third daughter, is also no pushover. She comes stomping into the cocktail party wearing boots instead of stilettos, a signal that this gal has spine and a mind of her own.

Throughout the madness is John Kirkpatrick as Kent, the loyal servant Lear banishes in a fit of pique. Kent’s devotion is so extreme he is prepared to suffer numerous personal indignities to keep his king safe. Although a smaller role, Kirkpatrick’s Kent is a fresh beacon of goodness in a world mired with corruption.

In a contrasting familial plot, Edmund, the evil bastard son of the Earl of Gloucester, initiates a plot to discredit Edgar, the legitimate heir. Julien Arnold as Gloucester is a softhearted touch easily manipulated by Edmund.

Edmund engineers a fake letter stating Gloucester is an enemy of the kingdom. The Duke of Cornwall, Regan’s husband, questions Gloucester and as punishment gouges his eyes. It is one of the most heart-stopping scenes as John Ullyatt’s Cornwall reveals himself as a lethal, unconscionable terrorist garbed as a noble man.

There are many extraordinary performances. Sheldon Elter as Edmund is chilling as he exposes a man’s ultimate greed and cruelty perpetuated against a family.

And Nathan Cuckow is both sympathetic and memorable as Edgar and his mad alter ego Poor Tom, a true white knight dressed in tatters.

When he finds Gloucester blinded and wandering in a suicidal state, the father-son bonding becomes apparent. Like his old friend Lear, Gloucester finally recognizes his mistake in believing and loving one child over another. And Arnold’s gentleness makes Gloucester’s unjust punishment all the more horrifying.

King Lear brings out a wide spectrum of emotions. It is both frightening and repulsive, touching and sentimental. And the streamlined script makes the play more friendly and accessible.

King Lear runs in repertory with Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Heritage Amphitheatre in Hawrelak Park. It plays on even nights until Saturday, July 20.