The Madness of George III
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King George III ... Nigel Hawthorne
Queen Charlotte ... Selina Cadell Prince of Wales ... Nick Sampson
Duke of York ... Julian Rhind-Tutt
Lady Pembroke/Margaret
Nicholson ... Richenda Carey
Fitzroy ... Anthony Calf
Greville ... William Chubb
Papandiek ... Matthew Lloyd Davies
Fortnum ... William Oxborrow
Braun ... Paul Corrigan
William Pitt ... Julian Wadham
Lord Thurlow ... Jeffry Wickham
Henry Dundas ... Simon Scott
Sir Boothby Skrymshir ... Collin Johnson
Ramsden ... Adam Barker
Charles James Fox ... David Verrey
Richard Brinsley Sheridan ...
Iain Mitchell
Sir George Baker ... Roger Hammond
Dr. Richard Warren ... Robert Swann
Sir Lucas Pepys ... Cyril Shaps
Dr. Francis Willis ... Clive Merrison
Maid ... Celestine Randall
Footman ... Tony Sloman
Without such a performance -- a masterful blend of integrity, compassion, humor and completely controlled and submerged technique --"Madness" would barely exist.
Although "Madness" includes supporting roles played by 22 other actors, Bennett has given none of them the robust dimensions he's lavished so sympathetically on his George III. It may of course be part of Bennett's point that, though apparently gone mad, George is the one real character in his play. But the other characters' lack of dimension does inhibit and stilt it, and it sometimes unfolds like a schoolroom history lesson. Yet throughout, Hawthorne, who won a Tony for his performance in "Shadowlands," pours his all into George III. When he's not onstage, which isn't often, the temperature of play and production drops noticeably.
Bennett has revised the play since its premiere at the National's Lyttelton Theater in London in November 1991. A scene has been dropped that flashed forward from 1788-89 to reveal a recent medical theory that the king's "madness" was actually a symptom of the metabolic disorder porphyria. The play seems to need it, since Bennett presents such a personal as well as revisionist view of the monarch who has been remembered almost solely for having lost both the American colonies and his mind.
The current production has been substantially recast from the 1991 original, and was polished for the nine-week U.S. tour by being returned to the Lyttelton repertory in July (it will return again when the tour ends).
Hawthorne, of course, remains. And so does Julian Wadham as a complete cold-fish of a Pitt (a singularly deft performance).
Elsewhere, however, the cast is not an improvement on the original. Several performers are difficult to hear, including Selina Cadell as Queen Charlotte, though she has the excuse of having to assume a Germanic accent. Nick Sampson is far too campy as the Prince of Wales. Heaven only knows what Richenda Carey thinks she's doing as the Queen's lady-in-waiting. And Adam Barker's Ramsden is too much of a total boob as a country bumpkin.
On the other hand, Jeffry Wickham is splendidly bluff and strong as the Lord Chancellor, never better than when playing Cordelia to George III's Lear in a scene from "King Lear" that, nevertheless, is too obvious a parallel to George's own plight. And Julian Rhind-Tutt paints a disarmingly reticent little cameo of the weak-minded Duke of York.
Mark Thompson's physical production -- primarily a stagewide flight of stairs enclosed by a gold frame -- has a welcome uncluttered quality, though his costumes and the production's wigs are sometimes overly caricatured, hobbling their wearers. Comparatively few props are used, a notable exception being a parade of chamber pots bearing the King's stools and purple urine, symptoms of both the royal illness and of Bennett's penchant for English schoolboy bathroom humor. The tour lighting needed cleaning up at the Sept. 14 performance (the use of footlights is a nice touch).
Nicholas Hytner's direction has a rich theatricality to it, as one would expect from the man who directed "Miss Saigon."
CONCERT
Lighting, Brian Ridley; music, Kevin Leeman; company voice work, Patsy Rodenburg; production manager, Stephen Rebbeck; company and stage manager, Courtney Bryant; sound, Scott Myers; costume supervisor, Lucy Gaiger; tour producer, Roger Chapman; tour general management, Ordway Music Theater, St. Paul, Minn.; tour press representatives, Boneau/Bryan-Brown. Royal National Theater director, Richard Eyre; executive director, Genista McIntosh. Opened Sept. 16, 1993, at the SCA's Rich Forum. Reviewed Sept. 14 (through Sept. 25); 757 seats; $ 60 top.
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