This week, the books were finally in our hands.
After several weeks of monologues, introductions, experimentation, and conversations about what everyone hopes to bring to the ensemble this year, we officially began reading King Lear. Before opening to Act 1, Scene 1, we spent some time getting acquainted with the play itself. We went through the characters together, practiced pronouncing their names, and talked about how our first read-through works: anyone can read any role, everyone should try different characters, and no one needs to worry about getting every word right.
Then we began.
Almost immediately, King Lear gave us plenty to talk about.
We started with Kent, Gloucester, and Edmund, stopping after their opening exchange to make sure we understood the relationships being established and why Shakespeare might begin the play there. Our conversation took us into questions about legitimate and illegitimate children, inheritance, and what those distinctions would have meant in Shakespeare’s time.
Then Lear arrived.
We paused after his first major speech to break down exactly what he was proposing. Lear plans to divide his kingdom among his three daughters, with their inheritances determined by how successfully they can publicly express their love for him. Goneril and Regan give him what he wants. Cordelia doesn’t.
The ensemble immediately had thoughts.
“She wasn’t going to suck his ass,” one ensemble member said about Cordelia.
Someone else put it simply: “He doesn’t like the truth.”
As we continued unpacking Cordelia’s refusal to participate in her father’s performance, another ensemble member translated Lear’s reaction into considerably more contemporary language: “Let that shit be your inheritance.”
Underneath the laughter was a serious conversation about what Lear is actually asking his daughters to do. Is he looking for love? Loyalty? Flattery? Control? And what happens when Cordelia refuses to give him the answer he expects?
As we moved further into the scene, the ensemble’s assessment of Lear became increasingly clear.
“[He’s] very egotistical,” one ensemble member observed.
Then another member pointed out one of the central contradictions in Lear’s plan: “It’s crazy he wants to keep the title but not do the work. You’re the King of Nothing.”
That idea opened up even more questions.
Lear wants to divide his kingdom and hand over the responsibilities that come with ruling it, but he isn’t prepared to surrender his identity as king – or the authority he expects everyone around him to continue granting him.
“He wants control,” an ensemble member said, imagining Lear insisting, “I still have a foot in the door.” She added, “King gives him a sense of pride.”
We connected Lear’s decision to modern inheritances and family dynamics, as well as the much larger political consequences of dividing power. We talked about succession and the ways uncertain transfers of power could lead to conflict both in Shakespeare’s plays and in the world in which he was writing.
By the time we reached Kent’s banishment, the ensemble was already predicting where Lear’s choices might take him.
“His plans are going to all fall apart,” one ensemble member said. “You can’t split a kingdom among two selfish people and still have a say. You have no say.”
“He’s going to have a rude awakening,” the ensemble member continued. “He made the biggest mistake of his life.”
Another ensemble member agreed that Lear wasn’t prepared for what he had started: “I don’t think he’ll take it very well. He’s just making it up as he goes.”
And another traced everything back to the moment when his expectations collided with Cordelia’s honesty: “What set him off was Cordelia.”
We stopped half-way through the first scene and pondered some questions we’ll explore throughout the season:
What does it mean to have power? What happens when you give that power away? Can you keep the respect, authority, and identity of a king after surrendering the responsibilities of being one?
Or, as one ensemble member put it much more efficiently:
“You’re the King of Nothing.”