Needcompany’s ‘King Lear’

Alternative title: King Lear
Synopsis: Video recording of the Needcompany deconstructed performance work King Lear. Performed with a cast of 11 (the roles of the Fool and Kent, Albany and Cornwall are doubled - played as twin punks), the play is presented in three languages - mostly Dutch with intermittent English and Cordelia speaking French.
Language: Dutch (Standard)
Country: United States
Medium: Video
Technical information: Colour / Sound
Recording date: 4 Nov 2001
Duration: 137 mins

Director

Jan Lauwers

Production Design

Jan Lauwers

Choreographer

Carlotta Sagna

Cast

Tom Jansen	Lear
Carlotta Sagna	Cordelia
Josse De Pauw	Fool
Misha Downey	Edgar, later disguised as Tom o’Bedlam
Anneke Bonnema	Regan
Dick Crane	Duke of Albany
Dick Crane	Duke of Cornwall
Grace Ellen Barkey	Goneril
Hans Petter Dahl	Edmund
Josse De Pauw	Earl of Kent
Tijen Lawton	Oswald
Timothy Couchman	King of France

Reviews: Bruce Weber, ‘When Shakespeare Could Use a Warning Label’ in New York Times (Review 2 November 2001). Weber writes: ‘Misha Downey a soft-spoken Edgar delivers his lines as if he had never studied acting and didn’t understand why he should’.

British Universities Film & Video Council