A promised duel ends before it begins when the King, to the bafflement of all, decides to banish both combatants. Threatened battles meet, by and by, with immediate and unconditional surrender--a debasement which the loser, not the victor, seems to demand. And the dignity of the throne-room scenes descends into absurdity when, late in the play, so many people are challenging each other to single combat that one nobleman needs to borrow an extra gauntlet to throw down.

With princely decorum disintegrating and without explicit, physically manifest struggle, this becomes a play about the subtle power of threat and the fragile psychology of the powerful. To enact such a play requires utter precision from actors and masterly storytelling powers from directors.

In the production that recently opened at the Yale Repertory Theatre, unfortunately, the storytelling fails at crucial points. Broadly speaking, director Evan Yionoulis captures quite well the symphonic blend of melee and anticlimax that comprise Shakespeare's play, but she fails to maintain the moment-to-moment clarity of the complex plot.

This is not to say that the production is completely formless, but a few particularly knotty scenes--scenes crucial to the cohesion and intelligibility of the play--fail to communicate even the basic information of characters' motivations and meanings.

One such scene, with which Ms. Yionoulis chooses to end the first half of the show, is the climactic confrontation between King Richard and his rival, Henry Bolingbrook, who has returned from banishment to claim his inheritance before Richard can seize and squander it. Meanwhile, Richard assumes that Henry also wants the crown--an offer which Bolingbrook accepts without batting an eye, despite his repeated protestations that he only wants his rightful inheritance.

In this scene, Jeffrey Carlson's campy theatrics as Richard preclude any real sense of the king's demoralization and Billy Eugene Jones (as Bolingbrook) plays steeliness to the point of inscrutability. With this as an act-closer, it was not surprising to hear conversations in hushed, bewildered tones filling the corners of the theater at intermission.

The pity is that both of these actors deliver rock-solid performances in isolated scenes. In the scene of his duel and banishment, Jones displays a subtle blend of anger and tact, courage and fear. Carlson, for his part, is very funny as the insouciant king of the early scenes and devastatingly muted when he must officially offer up his crown to Bolingbrook, but there is no compelling development connecting the two Richards.

Ms. Yionoulis also fails to control the comic potential of the later acts. For example, when a young lord rushes to King Henry to confess treason before his angry father can arrive to accuse him of it, she pushes her actors toward pure farce. In doing so, they lose sight of the real stakes (a human life, the betrayal of a son by his father) that make the humor shocking and powerful.

Although this production's trajectory is a bit wobbly, one performance in particular gives the play a sense of shape. Alvin Epstein as John of Gaunt, the aging father of Henry Bolingbrook, wields Shakespeare's verse so deftly and takes such full advantage of its emotive and intellectual punch, that Gaunt's deathbed lament over the degradation of England echoes through the rest of the play.

Even when the details of the story are muddled, Gaunt's ode to England's former self allows us to understand the larger stakes of the tussle over the throne. He may only appear in a few scenes, but he gives one of the best Shakespearean performances I have seen in years.

Brenda Davis's beautiful scenic design also succeeds in keeping in front of us the broader tensions of the play. Metal scaffolding comprises the bulk of the set, jutting out of the walls and arching high over the stage. Floating amid this matrix of criss-crossing metal are ten glass cases containing the gilded effigies of kings. Some, positioned upright, preside over the playing space while others, lying prone, seem like bodies lying in state. Kingly power and kingly mortality--the two axes of the play--intersect in this elegant design.

The atmosphere is that of a cathedral--a sacred space of humility and hushed voices. The set's serene power contrasts magnificently with the gaudy decadence of Richard's court and the rough cries of Henry's army. In Richard II, Shakespeare depicts the degradation of the Church through the ouster of a divinely appointed, if ineffectual, monarch; the contrast between Ms. Davis's set and the scenes played on and around it perfectly captures this sense of desecration.

Sign Up for Email AlertsEmail This Story

Your Email:

Recipient's Email:
Your Email:
Message (optional):