Comments on: Doing it Elizabethan Style: Shakespeare’s Richard III

By: Billie T. Preston

Billie T. Preston — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 18:47:42 +0000

This is theatre season and the talk is of actors and acting. I like to familiarize myself with a play before attending its performance because I can appreciate it much more. I never miss a play if I can help it, whether comedy or tragedy, though I prefer comedy. But I think the “offstage” is interesting, too—that is, if one can remain a spectator there. It is when we become involved that we lose our theatre perspective.

By: Alex

Alex — Sun, 13 Jan 2013 09:29:02 +0000

I like that they were raucous. It annoys me when mid20th century British attitudes are applied historically (which I have also seen in some of the reviews of your books)

By: Leslie

Leslie — Tue, 08 Jan 2013 19:33:43 +0000

I would so love to have seen this! I’ve only seen one scene from Richard III, and have never read it, but I just finished reading Alison Weir’s A Dangerous Inheritance which tells the story of Richard’s illegitimate daughter, Katherine Plantagenet, juxtaposed with the story of Katherine Grey 70 years later. It’s left me very interested in reading more about the time period. And I do love a good performance of Shakespeare.

By: Anne

Anne — Tue, 08 Jan 2013 13:57:00 +0000

I’m aware of it, of course – but Richard III is such a blatant piece of Tudor propaganda, it’s never been high on my list of must-see Shakespeare plays until recently. (I’m not a Ricardian, btw, but the play exaggerates Richard’s deformities and glosses over his virtues. I reckon he got rid of the princes and seized the throne not out of personal ambition, but because the alternative was a child king with the Woodvilles pulling all the strings – the very scenario illustrated by GRRM in A Song of Ice and Fire. But Elizabeth Woodville was Henry VIII’s grandmother, so she had to be whitewashed for Elizabeth I’s approval.)

By: Paul Weimer (@princejvstin)

Paul Weimer (@princejvstin) — Tue, 08 Jan 2013 13:37:32 +0000

whereas the only version of Richard III I’ve seen is the well-known Laurence Olivier film.

Have you not seen Looking for Richard, yet, Anne? Its not the complete play, but plenty of scenes and stuff are staged and discussed.