Review: Plummer's Lear Mad, in Disarray AP
Thu Mar 4, 9:12 PM ET
By MICHAEL KUCHWARA, AP Drama Critic

NEW YORK - Christopher Plummer (news)'s Lear is a mad, foolish monarch in majestic disarray.

From the moment he first staggers on stage in Lincoln Center Theater's star-driven production of "King Lear," the actor conveys the shaky weariness of a proud, obstinate man hurtling toward self-destruction.

It's an intense, personal performance, far and away the most compelling thing about director Jonathan Miller's unsurprising, somewhat staid revival, re-created — almost lock, stock and setting — from one done two summers ago by Canada's esteemed Stratford Festival.

The production itself is clear and unfussy. Miller has told the tale as cleanly as possible, carefully laying out the tangle of domestic dramas that are at the center of Shakespeare's tragedy. Yet it only fitfully touches the heart, depending almost solely on its leading actor to find the considerable emotion that is never very far beneath the surface of the play.

And "King Lear" is one of Shakespeare's greatest, among other things, an extraordinary examination of parents and children and what they do to each other.

Physically, the 76-year-old Plummer is a commanding presence. Sporting tufts of white hair and a handsome white beard, he draws the audience to him with the most subtle of gestures and that incredible voice. Poetic without being plummy, it rises and falls as the monarch goes through a harrowing personal journey that ends ultimately in despair. His voice roars with the best of them, and you feel the dramatic deflation when the actor is off stage.

Domini Blythe and Lucy Peacock give conventional, occasionally hammy performances as Lear's treacherous daughters, Goneril and Regan, while Claire Jullien is bland as Cordelia, the offspring who earns Lear's love too late. The women all look great, though, in designer Clare Mitchell's sumptuous costumes that seem to suggest a vaguely Elizabethan era.

However, "Lear" is more than just its title character and his children. There is a subplot involving the Duke of Gloucester (James Blendick) and his two sons, the virtuous Edgar and the illegitimate Edmund.

As the brothers who end up as mortal enemies, both Geraint Wyn Davies (news) as Edmund and Brent Carver (news) as Edgar, make strong impressions.

Wyn Davies, in particular, doesn't look like your traditional bad guy. The actor, a robust man with a broad face, has a directness about him that is intriguing. His villainy is more out in the open than usual, making him a worthy opponent for Edgar. Carver handles Edgar's innate goodness — not an easy thing to play — with skill.

Other supporting cast members are uneven. As Lear's Fool (of course, the smartest man on stage), Barry MacGregor seems colorless, while Benedict Campbell is a blustery, bellicose Kent. Ian Deakin and Stephen Russell give dutiful, uninspired performances as the husbands of Lear's villainous daughters, but Brian Tree is suitably creepy as Oswald, Goneril's loyal servant.

Ralph Funicello's spare thrust setting is adapted from legendary designer Tanya Moiseiwitsch's design for Stratford's Festival Theatre. It's minimalist chic.

New York has not been blessed with many productions of "King Lear." The last one of any consequence was a Public Theater production starring a miscast F. Murray Abraham in 1996 — and it fell wide of the mark. Lincoln Center's "Lear" at least has a theatrical whirlwind at the center of the storm, and he rages supreme even if the production does not.