Laurence Olivier Presents King Lear

Synopsis: Television production of the play, set in the year 800 and staged entirely in Granada’s Manchester studio, and one of the few not based on a prior stage production. With music specially composed by Gordon Crosse and played by members of the Halle Orchestra.Olivier’s swansong, and arguably his finest screen performance in a Shakespeare play.
Language: English
Country: Great Britain
Medium: Television
Technical information: Colour / Sound
Year of release: 2002
Transmission details: 3 Apr 1983 at 20:25 (Channel: Channel Four)
Duration: 159 mins

Notes: Source: Channel 4 Press Information, 2nd April - 8th April 1983
General: This was Olivier’s first-ever Shakespeare production exclusively for TV.
According to Channel 4 Press Information, the largest shower curtain in the world - 230 feet long - protected the studio electrical equipment when 900 gallons of cold water were poured down on Gielgud’s head.
History: First broadcast in the US 21 January 1984 in the Mobil Showcase Network (syndicated).
Awards: Emmy Award 1984 - Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited Series or a Special.
Reviews: Holland, Peter ‘Two-Dimensional Shakespeare: King Lear on Film’ in Davies, Anthony & Stanley Wells (eds) Shakespeare and the Moving Image: the Plays on Film and Television’ (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), pp, 50-68. [Analyses interpretations by Peter Brook, Michael Elliott, Jean-Luc Godard and Kozinstev].

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Shakespeare, "Laurence Olivier Presents King Lear". https://learningonscreen.ac.uk/shakespeare/search/index.php/title/11843 (Accessed 25 Nov 2024)

Laurence Olivier	Lear
Anna Calder-Mashall	Cordelia
Leo McKern	Earl of Gloucester
John Hurt	Fool
David Threlfall	Edgar, later disguised as Tom o’Bedlam
Benny Young	Servant of Cornwall
Brian Cox	Duke of Burgundy
Colin Blakely	Earl of Kent
Diana Rigg	Regan
Dorothy Tutin	Goneril
Edward Petherbridge	King of France
Esmond Knight	Old Man
Geoffrey Bateman	Oswald
Jeremy Kemp	Duke of Cornwall
Robert Lang	Duke of Albany
Robert Lindsay	Edmund

SHAKESPEARE