Imre Magyari D.: Social report from an unstable state
(Shakespeare: Richard III - Maladype Theatre, d.: Sándor Zsótér; Radnóti Theatre, d.: Andrei Serban)
“What news, what news in this our tottering state?” – Hastings asks it in the second scene of the third act (at 4am!) from Catesby in István Vas’ very excellent translation, which has been over worked by Péter Závada incredibly inventively now. I write here Ede Szigligeti too, as Sándor Zsótér, the director has chosen this for the performance of Maladype: “What news, what news is in our unstable state?”
We will learn it. We get careful, shocking and thought-provoking answer in both cases.
And an incredibly sad one, especially in case of Radnóti.
Catesby at that time, during the third act, has become Richard’s follower. He has come for a visit, because Buckingham invited him, to find out if Hastings is ready to vote on behalf of Richard as the future king. He is not. He has principles. He does not want to move away the “rightful heir” the Prince of Wales, who was Edward IV’s, the previous king’s son, who has just died, and who is seemed to be his king, but in spite of it, he thinks, that he must be very valuable for Richard. He is not right. Richard has decided, if Hastings does not agree with them, he will be executed. It is a radical solution, but it is fast and effective, Richard preferred them. Hastings has left prison for a while, where he was sent because of some kind of intrigue of the court. He should be more careful. He is too honest. He is too naïve. But he is happy at the same time, that the queen’s relatives will be executed in Pomfret. He is even vengeful: “Catesby, I do not need more than two weeks and / I will kill those, who do not even think about it.” Catesby has already known that nothing would happen: he does not support Richard’s coronation, he will be executed.
Busy times, busy moments! And it has just passed 4am!
For the first time, this play seems to be performed if something is smelled in Denmark, it is about the will of power. (This phrase is from Nietzsche; he thought it many ways, I would not talk about them now.) It is about the charming, the magic and possible ways of gaining of power. It can be seen as a Machiavellian book (The Prince was published in 1532, the play was written probably in 1592), or even more as an allegory, as it also shows, how can a tyrant, in a good case, end his way. There is a brilliant, very talented and very unprincipled man, Richard, the Prince of Gloster, who is ready to do anything to become king and to stay in that position of king. Maybe he is not so interested in power, but in the gaining of power, in the game, which is played for power. He is a compulsive gambler. Of course he is interested in power too, but he does not have time to practice reign. He does not tell a world about the things he would do as a king. He does not have any programme. (The young Prince of Wales, who is executed by Richard of course, has some, however they are a little bit illusory because of his young age: “If I live until I be a man, I'll win / our ancient right in France again, / Or die a soldier, as I live a king.”)
Richard right at the beginning explains us, the viewers, why he has decided that way:
According to the original version of the play:
“And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover.
To entertain these fair well-spoken days,
I am determined to prove a villain,
And hate the idle pleasures of these days.”
Is the exclusion because of some physical disadvantages enough for someone to decide that way? Is he excluded in reality? He feels that way, and it is enough for him, let’s accept it. He has been offended by creation and now takes revenge. (Who want to learn more about Richard’s past, feelings, they should read the Henry VI trilogy or at least the third part of it! In the first act of it, Richard enters the Throne room with Prince Somerset’s cut head, where his dad lazily sits onto the reigned king’s chair, and does not want to stand up from there when the he arrives – a good beginning, a good family!)
It may happen another way too, meanwhile: “Now is the winter of our discontent / Made glorious summer by this sun of York...”. But it does not happen, the glorious summer is just a passing moment, because Richard, as his father, it a nice family tradition in their case, wants to be a king.
He gets bored. He is cleverer than anybody. He also announces to us that “By drunken prophecies, libels and dreams” he has already made up a trick and dangerous logic: he turns his brother against each other; Clarence and the Edward, so the king.
He starts the machine, which will destroy himself too.
And this play can tell something eternal about human nature too.
The question is, that one man enough to form a tyranny, the future tyrant, no matter how ambitious, unscrupulous and talented even brilliant he is, or he needs also the others. Of course he does. For example some fawning and usable people, who can be turned against one another, and who can be set against each other. The question is, that do they always appear, if a capable tyrant decides to become a villain and starts doing things. The answer seems to be yes. We can ask, that those who remain by their rulers till the end, why do they do it. They can see what he does! Richard is not alone anyway even on the battlefield! He can count on Ratcliff for example, whom he can admit even his fear. (He said him that, which is in rhythm with his opening monologue, that “The sun does not want to shine...”!) We can see next to him Prince of Norfolk and the Earl of Surrey, and of course, the soldiers, whom he even tells an inspiring speech (we cannot hear it in the performances): “Shall these enjoy our lands? lie with our wives? / Ravish our daughters?” “These” can be connected to the “bastard Bretons”, who obviously want to get their culture... It does not turn out, why do Ratcliff and the others stay loyal, or what do the soldiers think about it inside. Anyway Lord Stanley from the safe distance can deny help finally. Buckingham has joined Richmond earlier. In reality, even Richard cannot trust anybody.
It is very informative if we study under a microscope the formation of tyrannical power, the possibility of it. How could the rule of thirty tyrants happen in the ancient Athens, how could Hitler, Mussolini, Rákosi, Stalin get the power, and how could they keep their power for such a long time? How could the newest social structures the so-called hybrid systems be formed and how could they consolidate during the past decades? These, of course, are not just the questions of literature and theatre, but also art tries to find the answers to them.
It is also a question if the fall of the tyrants is necessary and it would happen inevitably.
The Richard III is a firm and clear answer for this question, and the performances of the Maladype Theatre and of the Radnóti Theatre can interpret and think it on in a valid and shocking way. Both of them put a great stress on the drawing of the surrounding. “The desire rises in him – as we can read it on the website of Maladype – he wants to get to the top. But it would not be enough, if he just decides that way and wants it. He needs the others, who supports it. They work a lot for it.” “what is the surrounding like – the programme of Radnóti asks – which lets him rise?”
You have to be a good viewer on your chair to find your ways between the characters at once, and tell for the first time, who connects to whom, and even that who is who. (The original cast sheet mentioned thirty-three characters by names, if I counted it well!) Especially, if someone has seen the performance of this play for the first time, as – probably – those secondary school students, who filled the big room of the flat theatre of Maladype. (It was good to watch them, as they well behaved and interestedly followed through the two hours long performance without any breaks, and behind it there must have been a professional and enthusiastic literature teacher too – fortunately, there are still some of them.)
As performer myself, I also find it hard to understand the system of relationships. To prove it, let’s write here Manyi Kiss’ sentence, which has classical beauty. She cried it from the stage to the director, to László Vámos, during the rehearsal of the performance, which was performed in 1969 in Madách Theatre, during which she conscientiously prepared for the role of the Princess of York: “Laci! Who the hell I am for this Richard?” (For it for example, the answer is easy: the mother.) Even the writer got confuse sometimes with the relations: for example, during the first scene of the fourth act, one of Richard’s nieces appears, Margaret, about whom later the king says: “I have match'd her meanly” – but he did not make her married an ordinary man, but pricess Cecily! Of course, Shakespeare did not care much about these tiny things, he did not write a history book: but a play.
We have to add to it, and it is important that many times even the characters do not know, what kind of relationship do they have with the others, how do they connect to the others, as poor Hastings also measured his situation on a bad way. Everybody is very careful but everybody is misleading at the same time. Right at the beginning, Prince Clarence, who is the brother of Richard and Edward IV, who sits on the throne, (so the three of them, as I have mentioned, siblings!) is closed into the Tower according to the order of the ruler. He is led there, when he meets Richard, who has found out the all of it. Clarence (who is also George; even the usage of names can be confusing!) does not know of course, why he is sent to prison, and he is talking about some kind of divination, in which the king believes. According to which, his fall will be caused by a letter G, and his name (one of them!) begins with it: “...and such like toys / Have moved his highness to commit me now”. Richard nicely tells him, so confuses on, that behind the king there is his wife, Elizabeth, and her brother next to her, Earl of Rivers, as they have closed Lord Hestings too, who gets free now. Richard (whose other name, as it is Gloster, he is the Prince of Gloster, also starts with G, but Edward is not suspicious of him) offers helpfully his services, he goes to their brother, to the king: “I will deliver you, / or else lie for you: Meantime, have patience.” And Clarence believes him, he believes him blindly! However, as he disappears from the stage, Richard tells to us, to the viewers: “Go, tread the path that thou shalt ne'er return, / Simple, plain Clarence!” And he admits – or boasts with it? – that he will have his brother killed. And he sends not only one but two assassins to him...
People, on behalf of them they rule in theory, cannot be seen so much, maybe we just hear them: at a moment of the performance of Maladype, Richard (Zoltán Balázs) opens the window, so we can hear the noise of the street. He performs a role to people, to English ones too, the role of the gentle, pious, devout ruler, for whom power is a bother; it has to be pushed on him. It is not very irrelevant for him, what is said, what is thought about him. He takes care of his image. In order to not to turn the noise of the street into an uproar. However, the games of power in reality happen in a very small place, in case of Maladype in one single room. These games are not interesting for people, they do not know much about them, maybe they think that their wise rulers do everything in the best way – and the participants of the games are not interested in people, maybe only when they have to win them or when they start grumbling. Of course, they know that they have to feed people, in all meanings of the word. And with nice words, promises, with some kinds of allowances or with violence they have to be and they can be restrained. Ordinary people are as easily deceived as anyone else, however they do not think it about themselves.
It is true that during a short scene of the second act (missing from both performances) three ordinary people are talking, they have just heard that Edward is dead: “I fear, I fear, 'twill prove a giddy world.” – the second one says. They are afraid but hope too at the same time: “All shall be well.” They reality will be much worse than they have imagined it. In case of the performance in Radnóti, there is an important addition. When they try to convince Richard to become a king, some men appear between the viewers: “We protest on behalf of English people! You are a usurper! You are dishonest, Gloster! Edward is the heir of the English throne!” (So the prince of Wales, and according to the laws, after the death of the king he is Edward V.) Gloster agrees with them calmly: “They are right!” Of course, he is calm: people are led by Ratcliff, who is Richard’s follower! They have found it out! Buckingham – it is in the original text – tells the fake history of the family, according to which the Prince of Wales is a bastard, and people, who are obviously hired (are taken by bus there?), believe him, and they are repeating: “Bastard! Bastard! Bastard!” And as well: “Richard is our man! Richard! Richard!”
Well, the mood of the crowd can be changed in moments. Şerban has his own idea about the “crowd”, and people who form it. The same crowd could be seen in the memorable performance of Ibsen, staged by Gábor Zsámbéki, in case of the Enemy of the People, and in the performance of Hamlet, which was put on stage by László Bagossy. And it can be found in Karinthy’s famous short story, in Barabas from 1917, where to Pilatus’ question, that who must be freed, everybody wants to answer that: “The one from Nazareth”, but all of them shout that: “Barabas!”And this crowd is not obviously the worst one!
Richard can play calmly, he can push his luck till the end. He does not want to accept the throne anyway. He even waits until, people go without fulfil their task, he lets Catesby asks him for a while – it is a performance in front of the Lord Mayor – and then he surrenders: “Call them again; I am not made of stone!”
We can hear one more man, the clerk, in the sixth scene of the third act: he talks to us too, on the street of London, he does not dare to tell it to others. He tells us, that he copied Hastings’ indictment, and he knows that he was executed without any charge and investigation. “Here’s a goodly world! Who is so gross / That cannot see this palpable device? / Yet who’s so bold but says he sees it not?” Of course, he does not either. He states in some words the most common attitude of ordinary people. In case of the performance in Radnóti we can hear the clerk’s words from Shakespeare (Zsolt László) himself, and then he is here, he speaks a little bit with Richard.
People, in both performances anyway, are performed by us, by the viewers. They are talking to us, they shake our hands, in Radnóti sometimes even the lights are on sometimes above the viewers: we cannot avoid thinking about our own responsibilities. In the performance in Radnóti a podium and a microphone are important properties, as other objects can refer to our present tense. Anna (Eliza Sodró) talks to us, by talking into the microphone, she welcomes us nicely, then she curses Richard for long, at the entrance of whom she even asks us: “What? Are you shaking? So everybody is afraid of” Because Richard enters and proposes.
In the atmosphere of total uncertainty nobody can be sure about anything, nobody can trust anybody, as everybody tells lies, everybody plays roles, everybody takes care about their own interests only, which is about of course, the gaining, getting back, keeping of some kinds of power (and the easy survival). It is not obviously the royal power, but it is very important, and this power has benefits and privileges. For Buckingham Hereford’s earldom must be enough, and some properties, and of course the king’s favour. If he got them, he would not join the enemy – because he does it.
Even Richard cannot be sure about anybody!!!
In case of both performances the viewers’ uncertainty, obviously taking into consideration the possibilities, but as a result of the directors’ firm decisions, is strengthened obviously by the fact, that some actors play more roles. Many actors of Radnóti – Róbert Alföldi, György Gazsó, József Kelemen, Adél Kováts, Zsolt László, Márta Martin, András Pál, Ádám Porogi, András Rusznák, Zoltán Schneider, Eliza Sodró – perform more, in case of Maladype, Márton Pallag performs Edward, the Prince of Wales, George, Prince Clarence, Marquis of Dorset, Lord Stanley (who is the Earl of Derby at the same time), Zsigmond Bödők and Zoltán Friedenthal do two, Balázs Fila does three, Sándor Márkus performs four roles (he is queen Margit too, who is performed by a man, by Zsolt László in case of Şerban’s performance too!) There are tiny signs – for example a wig – which make differences between the characters, but who arrives to the court for the first time, can be confused as in case of the new colleagues of a new working place, who has just been known. Uncertainty is caused by the fact that we cannot always know where we are: the performances happen in one neutral place – in the place of history or power? – many things depend on our imagination, and it is right.
The fact of one actor-more roles marks, that in this surrounding anybody can become anything, from the killer until the victim.
Let’s see, who are here!
It is not easy if everybody is Edward or Richard or at least Henry...
We are at the time of the war of roses in 15th century. (Partly during the time of the hundred years long war, which was between England and France, on the places of France, started in 1337 and ended in 1453.) The fight started between the house of York and Lancaster, and of course the bet was the throne: its name came from the fact, that both families has a rose in their crests, in the one of the York a white one, while in the family of Lancaster’s a red one. It lasted for thirty years, from 1455 until 1485. We should think about György Szántó’s words, which can be read in the very readable, and even easy history of England (Maecenas, 1992.): “About the inner conflicts of the aristocracies that wore the roses, most of the English people could know as much as can be known today about the inner wars of factions of parties in the parliament. (Taking into special consideration the immaturity of newsagents. DMI) The real wars from the point of view of time and place, had a very small dimension, and only a few people were got involved... It cannot be told, that with the war of roses, that bloody and very long civil war would have been repeated, which burst out between Stephen and Queen Matild. This vision was formed, because that Tudor absolutism, which was put on throne after the end of the war of roses, could see aimfully their own dictatorship-like power got promoted that way. Shakespeare ... stepped on stage as the saviour of ideas of the absolutism of Elizabeth-era.”
Anyway, the two houses were the two branches of the same house of Plantagenet, but it was a problem. The heirs could argue about smaller pieces, and here they wanted to get the throne, the crown. VI. Henry, who was from the house of Lancaster, and during his childhood the noblemen were the rulers: the fought with each other, they imposed taxes, and crime got bigger during that time, the tension rose inside the society. Richard (another! exactly Richard III’s father), the Prince of York, wanted as a regent, that Henry VI, who is the descendant of Edward III’s fourth son, resigned from the throne on his behalf, as he is the descendant of the third son. That is how the war of roses started. Henry finally died in the Tower: Edward IV had him killed. (The society loved him, Shakespeare wrote a three parts long play about him, the two of it were translated by László Németh. As I have said, worth reading the trilogy, they are about the time before the era of Richard III, Richard was also there between the characters. It is worth, because we can see: they are also sinful in many things, who can raise condolence in us.) Henry VI’s wife, the cursing Anjou Margit – from the performance in 1969 I could only remember Miklós Gábor, who performed the main character, and Irén Psota, who was Margit, her enchanting course is kept on a recording too, in the past there was a series of programme called “Vastaps”. (There were not many recordings, but at least there was some.) And that is she, Lady Anna, who is the widow of Henry’s son, she was engaged by Richard, next to Henry’s coffin, who was her father-in-law, right at the end of the second scene of the second act. Anna’s husband was killed by Richard and his siblings, and in the play Richard states, that he killed also the woman’s father in a battle. In spite of all these, he wants to get married to he – and he does! It is a famous scene, in connection with it Sándor Petőfi, who hated the English, but admired Shakespeare (“he is the half of the creation on his own”), wrote in his critic in 1847 that “he has not got a partner in his grandeur”. Gábor Egressy chose this play as his showcase, which they performed with Péter Vajda’s translation, Szigligeti’s one is a later one in 1873. (Anyway Petőfi was also wrong, he said about the one in coffin to be Anna’s husband; he was wrong in connection with greater things too.) In reality the engagement could happen that way, as many other things, but Shakespeare in reality did not write a history book, but a play. In the end of which, the earl of Richmond appears, Tudor Henry at Bosworth has won over the others from York, Richard also dies (of course, in the play he was killed by the earl). Richmond becomes the new ruler with the name of Henry VII, as the first king of the house of Tudor, he did it with strong hands until 1509. He needed to be strong, as the members of the house of York did not accept their loss easily. Anyway, he got married to Edward IV’s daughter, York Elizabeth, and that way he connected the three noble families. Richmond does not appear, in any of the performances: in case of Maladype, Richard repeats his name with the knowledge of his loss for sure.
At the beginning of the play Edward IV is sitting on the throne (he reigned between 1461–1470 and 1471–1483; István Vas wrote his name as Edward). It is a sad thing on a throne where Richard wants to sit.
As the queen and her family go out after the big reconciliation, Richard starts immediately talking against them. As the possible rivals must be put aside from his way, and at the same time he has to win supporters, who can strengthen his own position the most. Clarence must be killed, it has happened, others have to be eliminated, he has to get married to Lady Anna. His time has come: York sunshine can light finally by him. He cannot miss the opportunity.
The scenes about the proposal of Anna to be his wife, right at the beginning, in the second scene of the first act, in reality is the most brilliant one in drama literature, suddenly I can put next to it, just the dialogue of Maria and Elizabeth from Schiller’s Stuart Maria. From the actors’ point of view, it can be harder, as a hardly imaginable – if it can be imagined anyway – turn, an inner change has to be made believable, but both Eliza Sodró and Ágota Szilágyi can solve the scene brilliantly. Shakespeare gave himself the task to write a dialogue, where the woman hates the man, who wants to talk to her at the beginning, she does not even want to talk to him, as he has killed her husband and father-in-law, Henry VI, above all, Anna is following the coffin of the later one form the Saint Paul Cathedral in London to the church of Chertsey Abbey – this coffin is missing from both performance, do not get confused even more. Anna is not so friendly: “Go away!” and Richard has to turn it. He uses everything, in spite of threatening and accusation. He tries to be overly familiar, (“Sweet saint” in the original play), he refers to pity, he replies wisely, he flatters, tells lies, accuses her, calls her a liar, he is impudent, he flirts (“Your beauty was the reason of the acts...”), he admits his love, he offers to be her husband. Then Anna spits him on, which is a clear evident of her antipathy. But Richard does not back down, and he even uses a new tool: he holds his sword to Anna, she should stab him, if she does not love him. Does he take a risk? He knows that she will not do it. It is true. Richard even knows that he has won. He still needs some short sentences, and then Anna pulls on Richard’s ring. At the time of saying goodbye she is flirtatious. And she leaves to go to her aspirant’s palace...
So it is useful if a man has a good speech.
Even Richard is surprised by the effect. Alföldi’s Richard does not believe it. He does not even think it before!
Anna later, in the fourth scene tells about it: “my woman's heart /
Grossly grew captive to his honey words..."
Well, yes, he did.
In November 2004 in the National Theatre, they performed Shakespeare’s masterpiece according to Péter Valló’s memorable staging. The main character was János Kulka. I watched the performance, when Anna was not performed by Ági Szalóky but by Judit Schell. In her brilliant performance the sexual desire was dominant: Richard seduced her as a man, as a male, he grabbed her – which denied immediately Richard’s picture about himself: well, he can obviously plays the lover! In a part of the performance of Maladype, Ágota Szilágyi is wearing just a bra, and Kata Huszárik’s dress, who performs the queen, is also provocative. In the performance of Radnóti, Eliza Sordó’s Anna later hurts her genitals: she does not let Richard’s child be born.
Richard has a speech fight with Elizabeth too in the fourth act: she is the one, whose stepson has already been killed by him by then, and he tries to persuade her – new conception – to convince one of her daughters, to get married to him, to the king. Kata Huszárik’s Elizabeth may try to do it, in case of Adél Kovács it does not happen for sure. When Elizabeth leaves, Alföldi’s Richard rates her strongly: “Stupid bitch” - the original “Thou lump of foul deformity!” has been turned into it. But a Richard of our modern time would tell it, especially in case of Alföldi.
Richard to our ruin, can play anything, he can do anything, he can reach anything, for a while at least, he has talent, form, charisma and courage or insolence instead, for it. Neither Clarence nor Edward are careless, but he can easily cheat them! None of them tries to speak with the other one, both of them believe blindly in Richard! Who is truly evil anyway. I would mention another sentence with classical beauty from the Hungarian theatre history: “This man has black shit!” – Kálmán Nádasdy told about him, in his staging from 1947, he put on stage the whole text in the National Theatre; it could not be a short performance.
Alföldi’s Richard is even infantile sometimes. As it is said, “there is text for it”, he tells in the first act to Margit: “I am too childish-foolish for this world.” According to it, he sometimes throws flowers, then he complains about a little bit of cold, he sometimes arrives in pyjamas with Mickey Mouse on it to an important meeting, where they decide about the crowning of the Prince of Wales. From where, after some minutes, he has Hastings brought away: “Cut his head!” (How does he have lawful right to do it? Does he have it? Why does not anybody protest? Anyway, who dares to do it? Lovel and Ratcliff get the exercises to do it, they accept it without any word; Ratcliff was enthusiastic in case of the killing of Grey, Rivers and Vaughan, of the queen’s relatives in Pomfret too. Buckingham is Richard’s accomplice. The bishop of Ely cannot see or hear on his behalf, he sends people for the strawberries, which Richard wants, in Radnóti we can see them red on the table in minutes. Nobody protests here. Richard can do what he wants to.)
The picture of the act is impressive as the psychopath’s personality can finds joy in the way of taking no attention to the norms of society (however, in Shakespeare’s time, the killing seemingly had different judgement, as it has today, however, the killing of children was judged even then. Richard killed both Clarence and Edward’s children), in the deception and manipulation of the others. He even uses the tool of fake news – well, it is not a new phenomenon, of course, not! However, today it is much easier to spread fake news, frightening news in the world. Richard tells that Edward’s children are bastards, so they were not born by his lawful wife: „Moreover, urge his hateful luxury / And bestial appetite in change of lust...” And Edward is only his step-brother, only their mother is the same, who cheated her husband, who fought in France. So, he slanders his own mother too, who is still alive! So he even spreads that Anna, who is his wife then, is seriously ill, she is about to die. So she will also die. He changes the conception. He tells us, to the viewers the reason of it too: “I must marry my brother's daughter, / Or else my kingdom stands on brittle glass. / Murder her brothers, and then marry her!”
In Radnóti Róbert Alföldi appears. His Richard is unpleasant for the first sight; his hair is unpleasant, and even his dress (costume: Fruzsina Nagy). Between the changes (the version of the text is made by Şerban and Daniela Dima, and the literary consultant, as I have said, Péter Závoda; Zsótér’s dramaturg as usual Júlia Ungár is) it is very important, that this performance does not start with the famous monologue, but with a part of the forth scene of the forth act, with the dialogue between Princess of York and Richard, between the mother and her son: "Art thou my son?" / "Ay, I thank God, my father, and yourself." But after the first two lines it also changes, back to the end of the third part of Henry VI: Richard’s words come from there, with László Németh’s translation, that “There is piece in my home. Both my brothers love me.” Here is sounds as “There is piece in my home...” and from “Let’s come here, Bess...”, we get “Let’s come here my little Elizabeth...”, and with it he starts the bitter frivolity nature of his words, which is there all through the performance. And there are some important words for Richard, in his long monologues from the second scene of the third act of the same play, in the end of which we can also hear Machiavelli’s name too. Now he only asks: “And am I them a man to be belov’d?”, and Alföldi repeats it many times. What kind of answer does he want? Would he like to get love? If he asks it, then he probably yes. Then he suddenly says: ”O fearful error in the mind to think!” And he states: “I'll make my heaven to dream upon the crown, / And, whiles I live, to account this world but hell...” He does not tell a word that what he will do if he wins. He sits on it, holds its arms, until he can. He thinks that he is suitable for it: “Well, I can smile and kill smilingly...” Yes, he can.
The showing of Richard’s personality is very enchanting: it is a perfect clinical picture. He gives us the creeps. But even more enchanting the showing of the acts, he does, he can do them besides his own characteristics, because his surrounding, for different reasons, lets him, leaves him, and even supports and helps him. As I have said, Richard III is study of society too, as a very good performance can do it too – as both of them, which are mentioned here.
It is easy to find both unprincipled followers and loyal servants, even those who are close to his rank, who are loyal until it is also good to them. Lovel and Ratcliff fulfil the orders without any argument. The relatives, who are moved away, Grey, Rivers and Vaughan, do not live for long, as well as Hastings, his cut head is taken to their ruler as a nice gift.
It is harder to find a deserving ally, but there are some. Here is Prince Buckingham, who is also a relative, he is Richard’s nephew. He is a true partner, he is deserved to get into the game by Richard. After the big reconciliation of the family and after Richard’s words, which prove the queen and her family to be sinful Buckingham tells Richard, on his and lord Stanley’s behalf that: “We will attend you, your Grace.” (In case of Şerban he talks in first person singular. He does not share is.) He is in reality – after one of Stanley’s nightmares, in which a wild boar, Richard’s heraldic animal, broke his hat, and he would like to escape. He is afraid. Buckingham is not. When he leaves for Ludlow for the heir of the throne, after the king’s death, who is the king at the time, according to the English laws, he is just had to be crowned, he tells: "...by the way, / As next to place, I'll count the queen's proud kindred / From the prince's person to remove." (They talked about it outside the stage.) Richard calls him enthusiastically to be his “better ego”, “his nice relative”. Later, in the fifth scene of the third act, he shows his cards, at least some of them, he asks: “Come, cousin, canst thou quake, and change thy colour...” He can. They change immediately their common knowledge into practice, they form a scene in front of the just invited and arriving Lord Mayor about Hastings, the traitor, who has wanted to kill them... It will be the mayor’s task to share between people that Hastings deserved his fate. He also begs Richard to accept the crown finally. Buckingham remains by Richard, until he tells him that Edward’s children have to die. It is too much for him. Well, it is on the edge. He asks for his parts: the earldom of Hereford and the properties of the previous king, which Richard has promised to him. If he gets them, he agrees. He asks it at the wrong moment. He thinks, that he has got out of favour. He escapes. More exactly he escapes to Richard’s enemy, to Bretagne to Richmond, as well as the others do, more and more. And the support Richmond to come back home and fight for the crown. Catesby and Ratcliff are those who hold on.
Richard makes a terrible mistake, when he does not fulfil Buckingham’s ask and especially when he lets him escape. In the performance of Radnóti, he spectacularly humiliates him – pees on him – but then lets him go. And the hurt and already humiliated Buckingham runs: to Richmond. And above all, he does not do it alone: he collects an army...
There are those, who cannot recognise, what is going on around them. They are naïve. They believe in Richard and trust him. The cardinal, who first does not want to make the queen, who has escaped to Westminster, spend her younger son, who she has taken with herself, to the Prince of Wales, and then he backs down immediately not after Richard’s but Buckingham’s words. They can be the most interesting ones: who believe in the system in reality and do not recognise that they are living in tyranny. It is a shame that there are not many of these kind of figures in case of Shakespeare. There are some of course, who does not want to recognise what happens. Their own comfort and position are more important for them. As in the case of the bishop of Ely and his strawberries...
And finally there are some people, who hate Richard unforgivingly for a long time. They see through him. First of all, the frightening, cursing queen Margit, who has cursed almost everybody, and whose curses seem to be effective. (We can learn a lot about her too from Henry VI.) Queen Elizabeth, Richard has had two of her sons killed, not to become any of them a king. And which is the most horrible one, his own mother, Princes of York, who cursed him: “My pray will fight on your enemies’ side” . The first part of the forth scene of the forth act is shocking: the three women, who have stresses relationship with each other too, are connected by their hate towards Richard. But Richard have more and more those kinds of enemies, about whom, we just hear something, who collect army and join to Richmond. For a long time it is true, what is said by Buckingham, who has been captivated and taken to execute: “Sin will pluck on sin, and shame on shame.”, but this horrible process can be broken too.
Richmond, so Tudor Henry after the battle in Tewkesbury in 1471, went to Bretagne – now in 1985 we are two years after Richard’s coronation. He rightfully thought, that he had right for the throne: he was the only male descendant of the house of Lancaster. In the battle of Bosworth he defeated Richard, originally the play ends with his words: “peace starts living”, a new era begins, it is wonderful: Richmond, who gets on throne with the name of Henry VII, will have a grandchild, who will be Shakespeare’s ruler, Elizabeth, who was born from the marriage of Henry VIII and Boleyn Anna.
Zsótér and especially Şerban do not believe in this peace.
Richmond does not appear in any of these performances. With whom a new era could start anyway, is nowhere. In case of Zsótér’s performance, we cannot hear the closing monologue, in Şerban’s performance, Elizabeth tells it. King Edward’s words, from the Henry VI, which can be heard at the beginning of the performance – “There is peace in my home...” – turn out to be wrong soon, and they have not been true even for a moment. That is all about the ruler’s sense of reality. The circle, which begins with his words, is closed now. “Now civil wounds are stopp’d, peace lives again: / That she may long live here, God say amen!” In these performances it is not probable. And nothing would have been solved even if the Prince of Wales had been put on the throne: Edward’s children are silly in both performances, they are almost mad. There is no way out.
From Richmond, as a positive hero, Richard’s punishment is much more interesting, which is presented in both performances.
Here we should think about what György Csepeli has written in his critic about the performance of Maladype (Mozgó Világ, 2026.): “The prince only says, that he wants to be a villain, in reality, he wants power, in connection with which, we cannot talk about neither the moral scheme of wickedness nor of kindness.” Csepeli is one of the best social-psychologists on international level too, who has written a book with the title of The Anatomy of Power (Kossuth, 2013), and above all, as a state-secretary he was also the part of power – without this role, he did not write his book, as he said it. Then he goes on: “Max Weber tells about power, that it is »legitimate physical violence«, so with other words, it is the right for killing. He kills in his everyday life (or has someone killed), that man leaves the order of life, he commits a crime and loses his right to live. The situation is different in case of the sovereign ruler, who can kill and have someone killed, as it is said by Carl Schmitt, he is outside order, however, he is connected to it, as he decides, who are friends, who are necessary for the keeping of the order, and who are enemies, who threaten it. The power, is the situation of guiltless guilty, which has very strong attraction on those, whose ego cannot hold the yoke of order, and they want to form the order according to their thoughts. Some can do it, some cannot. Shakespeare’s case study is about an unsuccessful trial.”
It is hard to argue with György Csepeli, because of the incredible amount of his knowledge, but I have to, because I do not agree with him. (However, it is true that I have never been a state-secretary.) Richard wants power in reality, but he does not only tell that he will be a villain: he wants power so much, that he is ready to become a villain for it, as anyway he cannot get it. He tells it to the viewers at the beginning – why would he lie to us? We are his confidants. That question is more important, if the “moral scheme” of wickedness and kindness can be connected to power, is a sovereign ruler “outside” the order in reality, is he out, if he thinks like this, because he does not want to put on the yoke of order. (And of course: he is outside of which order, from where does this order come...) According to me no, the rules of the society can be connected to everybody, and if somebody does not accept them, as the evil ones from the 20. century did, then the society would punish them sooner or later. Just take Ceauşescu’s situation into consideration. Or the revolution of 56’.
I know, what I write is very sketchy, but I do not want to get into unknown place. Anyway Richard is punished, and both performances show it stressed. In his dream, the ones’ ghosts, who he killed (in Radnóti, they are put into bags, and seem to be a little bit silly), curse him now, (“Despair, and die!"), and we can even hear, that they bless Richmond, as he tells it himself, and his conscience – it is a strange word from his mouth – stings him. He knows, that he has committed crimes, he knows at the moment he does them, but what he does, is a sin. The first in the line was the act of putting Clarence into prison and the act of killing him – by the way, as an extra task, he was careful to make the seriously ill king Edward believe, that his brother was killed because of his reckless order. (We do not hear the giving of this order, only what Edward says, when Richard talks him about Clarence’s death: “Did he dies? But the order was withdrawn!” He does not even think about what could happen in reality.)
Richard’s words, which he says after getting up from a nightmare, are about complete confusion inside:
„What do I fear? Myself? There's none else by.
Richard loves Richard, that is, I am I.
Is there a murderer here? No. Yes, I am.
Then fly! What, from myself? Great reason why:
Lest I revenge. What, myself upon myself?
Alack, I love myself. Wherefore? For any good
That I myself have done unto myself?
O, no! Alas, I rather hate myself
For hateful deeds committed by myself.
I am a villain. Yet I lie; I am not.
Fool, of thyself speak well. Fool, do not flatter.
Some lines are missing, but I quote them:
My conscience hath a thousand several tongues,
And every tongue brings in a several tale,
And every tale condemns me for a villain.
And we can hear these:
"I shall despair. There is no creature loves me;
And if I die, no soul shall pity me."
Not only the circle of the history is closed, but soon Richard’s self circle too: “...am I a lovable one?” – he asked it at the beginning. He knows then that he is unable to be loved, but he stubbornly does not want to be loved. Here he is seemed to be confused that nobody loves him, and maybe it has confused him so far too. He wanted to be a villain – then he has become. (He returns, twice, the word of villain.) What has he reached with it? Or he must have been even more skilful?
His torn monologue, which is said not to us now, but to himself (anyway, others can be understood that way), makes us remember János Kádár’s last speech, which he said on 12th April 1989 on the closed meeting of Central Committee of MSZMP. Maybe Imre Nagy was the one, who appeared in his dreams.
There are of course, politicians, who are without conscience, and who are unscrupulous, who do not regret anything, as they think in the last moment too that they have nothing to regret. It is remarkable but of course, it can be explained, if in the political system of the world Donald Trump could appear. He is not alone of course, here is Duterte, Erdoğan, Putin, and none of them can know anything about the remorse or shame. I can mention many Hungarian politicians too, we have experienced extreme things since 2010 and the change is still far away, we cannot see the possibility. But I think that sins are sins in spite of all these. And fortunately we can see those politicians too on the international level and in Hungary too, who want good for the society, which they lead, or they would like to lead.
Richard is not seemed to be the one, who regrets his acts, and finally he even gets himself together, and leaves to the battle that way. He does not win this one, no matter how hard he fights. („Daring an opposite to every danger” – Catesby says it with devotion in the original text.) If he won, would rule on the same way, as he has done before. Or even harder, if it is possible anyway.
A question can be, that what causes his fall. Another question can be, but not inside the play, would he fall if Richmond did not fight against him. If he had fulfilled Buckingham’s tiny desire, and Buckingham would have joined to Richmond’s side? György Csepeli talked about Richard’s figure in Borbála Ferenczi’s book of speech, with the title of Fate-chooser, (Kossuth, 2018) about his own career as a politician. He said that the owner of power gets further, and rid of those who warn him about his different failures. “Those who do not give any feedbacks, are the members of the court anyway: the followers, who are depended on you. Obviously they will not tell, if you do it wrong. The mirror disappears, and a picture is formed in you, which can cause Richard III’s death: these is not anybody, who can tell that that is all, no more to do.” So maybe, we cannot do anything without punishment, even if it seems to be that way for long.
The newer question is that how long he could rule. Inside the play there is not any answer to it, and it does not turn out clearly, why does Richmond listen to the English people, who support him. Why he goes on the sea, does he want to stop tyranny, does he want to be a king, or does he want to be a king by stopping tyranny, and if he becomes a king, does not he turn to be a tyrant himself too. The play indicates that he will be a good ruler. In both performance there is not any release.
Anyway, at the beginning of the 21st century, we can know, that the sunshine of York – or Lancaster – just rarely and for a short period of time can change into shining summer the permanent winter of our bad mood.
The critic was published in Criticai Lapok 2018/11–12. in a shorter version.
(translated by: Veronika Fülöp)
“What news, what news in this our tottering state?” – Hastings asks it in the second scene of the third act (at 4am!) from Catesby in István Vas’ very excellent translation, which has been over worked by Péter Závada incredibly inventively now. I write here Ede Szigligeti too, as Sándor Zsótér, the director has chosen this for the performance of Maladype: “What news, what news is in our unstable state?”
We will learn it. We get careful, shocking and thought-provoking answer in both cases.
And an incredibly sad one, especially in case of Radnóti.
Catesby at that time, during the third act, has become Richard’s follower. He has come for a visit, because Buckingham invited him, to find out if Hastings is ready to vote on behalf of Richard as the future king. He is not. He has principles. He does not want to move away the “rightful heir” the Prince of Wales, who was Edward IV’s, the previous king’s son, who has just died, and who is seemed to be his king, but in spite of it, he thinks, that he must be very valuable for Richard. He is not right. Richard has decided, if Hastings does not agree with them, he will be executed. It is a radical solution, but it is fast and effective, Richard preferred them. Hastings has left prison for a while, where he was sent because of some kind of intrigue of the court. He should be more careful. He is too honest. He is too naïve. But he is happy at the same time, that the queen’s relatives will be executed in Pomfret. He is even vengeful: “Catesby, I do not need more than two weeks and / I will kill those, who do not even think about it.” Catesby has already known that nothing would happen: he does not support Richard’s coronation, he will be executed.
Busy times, busy moments! And it has just passed 4am!
For the first time, this play seems to be performed if something is smelled in Denmark, it is about the will of power. (This phrase is from Nietzsche; he thought it many ways, I would not talk about them now.) It is about the charming, the magic and possible ways of gaining of power. It can be seen as a Machiavellian book (The Prince was published in 1532, the play was written probably in 1592), or even more as an allegory, as it also shows, how can a tyrant, in a good case, end his way. There is a brilliant, very talented and very unprincipled man, Richard, the Prince of Gloster, who is ready to do anything to become king and to stay in that position of king. Maybe he is not so interested in power, but in the gaining of power, in the game, which is played for power. He is a compulsive gambler. Of course he is interested in power too, but he does not have time to practice reign. He does not tell a world about the things he would do as a king. He does not have any programme. (The young Prince of Wales, who is executed by Richard of course, has some, however they are a little bit illusory because of his young age: “If I live until I be a man, I'll win / our ancient right in France again, / Or die a soldier, as I live a king.”)
Richard right at the beginning explains us, the viewers, why he has decided that way:
According to the original version of the play:
“And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover.
To entertain these fair well-spoken days,
I am determined to prove a villain,
And hate the idle pleasures of these days.”
Is the exclusion because of some physical disadvantages enough for someone to decide that way? Is he excluded in reality? He feels that way, and it is enough for him, let’s accept it. He has been offended by creation and now takes revenge. (Who want to learn more about Richard’s past, feelings, they should read the Henry VI trilogy or at least the third part of it! In the first act of it, Richard enters the Throne room with Prince Somerset’s cut head, where his dad lazily sits onto the reigned king’s chair, and does not want to stand up from there when the he arrives – a good beginning, a good family!)
It may happen another way too, meanwhile: “Now is the winter of our discontent / Made glorious summer by this sun of York...”. But it does not happen, the glorious summer is just a passing moment, because Richard, as his father, it a nice family tradition in their case, wants to be a king.
He gets bored. He is cleverer than anybody. He also announces to us that “By drunken prophecies, libels and dreams” he has already made up a trick and dangerous logic: he turns his brother against each other; Clarence and the Edward, so the king.
He starts the machine, which will destroy himself too.
●●●
Richard III elevates high between the other plays of kings, so it has a universal meaning, because – however, for aesthetic point of view it is not the most perfect one, but anyway with its impressive descriptiveness and wealth – it can show, model, how one type of the machine of power can work. How was it born, how it can be deformed and how the tyrant can end. If it ends anyway – in case of Serban’s staging it does not end, and in case of Zsótér we cannot be sure that something good will come.And this play can tell something eternal about human nature too.
The question is, that one man enough to form a tyranny, the future tyrant, no matter how ambitious, unscrupulous and talented even brilliant he is, or he needs also the others. Of course he does. For example some fawning and usable people, who can be turned against one another, and who can be set against each other. The question is, that do they always appear, if a capable tyrant decides to become a villain and starts doing things. The answer seems to be yes. We can ask, that those who remain by their rulers till the end, why do they do it. They can see what he does! Richard is not alone anyway even on the battlefield! He can count on Ratcliff for example, whom he can admit even his fear. (He said him that, which is in rhythm with his opening monologue, that “The sun does not want to shine...”!) We can see next to him Prince of Norfolk and the Earl of Surrey, and of course, the soldiers, whom he even tells an inspiring speech (we cannot hear it in the performances): “Shall these enjoy our lands? lie with our wives? / Ravish our daughters?” “These” can be connected to the “bastard Bretons”, who obviously want to get their culture... It does not turn out, why do Ratcliff and the others stay loyal, or what do the soldiers think about it inside. Anyway Lord Stanley from the safe distance can deny help finally. Buckingham has joined Richmond earlier. In reality, even Richard cannot trust anybody.
It is very informative if we study under a microscope the formation of tyrannical power, the possibility of it. How could the rule of thirty tyrants happen in the ancient Athens, how could Hitler, Mussolini, Rákosi, Stalin get the power, and how could they keep their power for such a long time? How could the newest social structures the so-called hybrid systems be formed and how could they consolidate during the past decades? These, of course, are not just the questions of literature and theatre, but also art tries to find the answers to them.
It is also a question if the fall of the tyrants is necessary and it would happen inevitably.
The Richard III is a firm and clear answer for this question, and the performances of the Maladype Theatre and of the Radnóti Theatre can interpret and think it on in a valid and shocking way. Both of them put a great stress on the drawing of the surrounding. “The desire rises in him – as we can read it on the website of Maladype – he wants to get to the top. But it would not be enough, if he just decides that way and wants it. He needs the others, who supports it. They work a lot for it.” “what is the surrounding like – the programme of Radnóti asks – which lets him rise?”
You have to be a good viewer on your chair to find your ways between the characters at once, and tell for the first time, who connects to whom, and even that who is who. (The original cast sheet mentioned thirty-three characters by names, if I counted it well!) Especially, if someone has seen the performance of this play for the first time, as – probably – those secondary school students, who filled the big room of the flat theatre of Maladype. (It was good to watch them, as they well behaved and interestedly followed through the two hours long performance without any breaks, and behind it there must have been a professional and enthusiastic literature teacher too – fortunately, there are still some of them.)
As performer myself, I also find it hard to understand the system of relationships. To prove it, let’s write here Manyi Kiss’ sentence, which has classical beauty. She cried it from the stage to the director, to László Vámos, during the rehearsal of the performance, which was performed in 1969 in Madách Theatre, during which she conscientiously prepared for the role of the Princess of York: “Laci! Who the hell I am for this Richard?” (For it for example, the answer is easy: the mother.) Even the writer got confuse sometimes with the relations: for example, during the first scene of the fourth act, one of Richard’s nieces appears, Margaret, about whom later the king says: “I have match'd her meanly” – but he did not make her married an ordinary man, but pricess Cecily! Of course, Shakespeare did not care much about these tiny things, he did not write a history book: but a play.
We have to add to it, and it is important that many times even the characters do not know, what kind of relationship do they have with the others, how do they connect to the others, as poor Hastings also measured his situation on a bad way. Everybody is very careful but everybody is misleading at the same time. Right at the beginning, Prince Clarence, who is the brother of Richard and Edward IV, who sits on the throne, (so the three of them, as I have mentioned, siblings!) is closed into the Tower according to the order of the ruler. He is led there, when he meets Richard, who has found out the all of it. Clarence (who is also George; even the usage of names can be confusing!) does not know of course, why he is sent to prison, and he is talking about some kind of divination, in which the king believes. According to which, his fall will be caused by a letter G, and his name (one of them!) begins with it: “...and such like toys / Have moved his highness to commit me now”. Richard nicely tells him, so confuses on, that behind the king there is his wife, Elizabeth, and her brother next to her, Earl of Rivers, as they have closed Lord Hestings too, who gets free now. Richard (whose other name, as it is Gloster, he is the Prince of Gloster, also starts with G, but Edward is not suspicious of him) offers helpfully his services, he goes to their brother, to the king: “I will deliver you, / or else lie for you: Meantime, have patience.” And Clarence believes him, he believes him blindly! However, as he disappears from the stage, Richard tells to us, to the viewers: “Go, tread the path that thou shalt ne'er return, / Simple, plain Clarence!” And he admits – or boasts with it? – that he will have his brother killed. And he sends not only one but two assassins to him...
●●●
But do the viewers have to know well the relationships between the characters, do they have to know punctually that who is who? Not necessarily. It is not bad of course, but it is not necessary at all. The important thing is, what happens in front of us: someone uses unscrupulously people, relatives and those, who are not relatives, to fulfil his own aims, and if it is good according to him, he unscrupulously make them disappear, kill them, so for sure, he destroys them physically. Without knowing the system of relationship, maybe it is even easier to experience, understand that totalised unpredictability and uncertainty, in which the characters live. However, they are not no ones, they are kings, princes, earls. Mostly we can see that – the queen tells it when she learns about the arrest of her brother and one of her sons – “Destruction comes, blood, and massacre!” In this play almost everybody is interested in power, almost everybody wants the power: if they have lost it then that is why, if they have not got it, then that is why, and if they have owned it, then that is why. There is one, who suffers because of it, Elizabeth: “I had rather be a country servant-maid / Than a great queen, with this condition” Or does she suffer because she is “hurt, despised”, and if it did not happen that way then she would rule happily?People, on behalf of them they rule in theory, cannot be seen so much, maybe we just hear them: at a moment of the performance of Maladype, Richard (Zoltán Balázs) opens the window, so we can hear the noise of the street. He performs a role to people, to English ones too, the role of the gentle, pious, devout ruler, for whom power is a bother; it has to be pushed on him. It is not very irrelevant for him, what is said, what is thought about him. He takes care of his image. In order to not to turn the noise of the street into an uproar. However, the games of power in reality happen in a very small place, in case of Maladype in one single room. These games are not interesting for people, they do not know much about them, maybe they think that their wise rulers do everything in the best way – and the participants of the games are not interested in people, maybe only when they have to win them or when they start grumbling. Of course, they know that they have to feed people, in all meanings of the word. And with nice words, promises, with some kinds of allowances or with violence they have to be and they can be restrained. Ordinary people are as easily deceived as anyone else, however they do not think it about themselves.
It is true that during a short scene of the second act (missing from both performances) three ordinary people are talking, they have just heard that Edward is dead: “I fear, I fear, 'twill prove a giddy world.” – the second one says. They are afraid but hope too at the same time: “All shall be well.” They reality will be much worse than they have imagined it. In case of the performance in Radnóti, there is an important addition. When they try to convince Richard to become a king, some men appear between the viewers: “We protest on behalf of English people! You are a usurper! You are dishonest, Gloster! Edward is the heir of the English throne!” (So the prince of Wales, and according to the laws, after the death of the king he is Edward V.) Gloster agrees with them calmly: “They are right!” Of course, he is calm: people are led by Ratcliff, who is Richard’s follower! They have found it out! Buckingham – it is in the original text – tells the fake history of the family, according to which the Prince of Wales is a bastard, and people, who are obviously hired (are taken by bus there?), believe him, and they are repeating: “Bastard! Bastard! Bastard!” And as well: “Richard is our man! Richard! Richard!”
Well, the mood of the crowd can be changed in moments. Şerban has his own idea about the “crowd”, and people who form it. The same crowd could be seen in the memorable performance of Ibsen, staged by Gábor Zsámbéki, in case of the Enemy of the People, and in the performance of Hamlet, which was put on stage by László Bagossy. And it can be found in Karinthy’s famous short story, in Barabas from 1917, where to Pilatus’ question, that who must be freed, everybody wants to answer that: “The one from Nazareth”, but all of them shout that: “Barabas!”And this crowd is not obviously the worst one!
Richard can play calmly, he can push his luck till the end. He does not want to accept the throne anyway. He even waits until, people go without fulfil their task, he lets Catesby asks him for a while – it is a performance in front of the Lord Mayor – and then he surrenders: “Call them again; I am not made of stone!”
We can hear one more man, the clerk, in the sixth scene of the third act: he talks to us too, on the street of London, he does not dare to tell it to others. He tells us, that he copied Hastings’ indictment, and he knows that he was executed without any charge and investigation. “Here’s a goodly world! Who is so gross / That cannot see this palpable device? / Yet who’s so bold but says he sees it not?” Of course, he does not either. He states in some words the most common attitude of ordinary people. In case of the performance in Radnóti we can hear the clerk’s words from Shakespeare (Zsolt László) himself, and then he is here, he speaks a little bit with Richard.
People, in both performances anyway, are performed by us, by the viewers. They are talking to us, they shake our hands, in Radnóti sometimes even the lights are on sometimes above the viewers: we cannot avoid thinking about our own responsibilities. In the performance in Radnóti a podium and a microphone are important properties, as other objects can refer to our present tense. Anna (Eliza Sodró) talks to us, by talking into the microphone, she welcomes us nicely, then she curses Richard for long, at the entrance of whom she even asks us: “What? Are you shaking? So everybody is afraid of” Because Richard enters and proposes.
In the atmosphere of total uncertainty nobody can be sure about anything, nobody can trust anybody, as everybody tells lies, everybody plays roles, everybody takes care about their own interests only, which is about of course, the gaining, getting back, keeping of some kinds of power (and the easy survival). It is not obviously the royal power, but it is very important, and this power has benefits and privileges. For Buckingham Hereford’s earldom must be enough, and some properties, and of course the king’s favour. If he got them, he would not join the enemy – because he does it.
Even Richard cannot be sure about anybody!!!
In case of both performances the viewers’ uncertainty, obviously taking into consideration the possibilities, but as a result of the directors’ firm decisions, is strengthened obviously by the fact, that some actors play more roles. Many actors of Radnóti – Róbert Alföldi, György Gazsó, József Kelemen, Adél Kováts, Zsolt László, Márta Martin, András Pál, Ádám Porogi, András Rusznák, Zoltán Schneider, Eliza Sodró – perform more, in case of Maladype, Márton Pallag performs Edward, the Prince of Wales, George, Prince Clarence, Marquis of Dorset, Lord Stanley (who is the Earl of Derby at the same time), Zsigmond Bödők and Zoltán Friedenthal do two, Balázs Fila does three, Sándor Márkus performs four roles (he is queen Margit too, who is performed by a man, by Zsolt László in case of Şerban’s performance too!) There are tiny signs – for example a wig – which make differences between the characters, but who arrives to the court for the first time, can be confused as in case of the new colleagues of a new working place, who has just been known. Uncertainty is caused by the fact that we cannot always know where we are: the performances happen in one neutral place – in the place of history or power? – many things depend on our imagination, and it is right.
The fact of one actor-more roles marks, that in this surrounding anybody can become anything, from the killer until the victim.
Let’s see, who are here!
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I will teach now.It is not easy if everybody is Edward or Richard or at least Henry...
We are at the time of the war of roses in 15th century. (Partly during the time of the hundred years long war, which was between England and France, on the places of France, started in 1337 and ended in 1453.) The fight started between the house of York and Lancaster, and of course the bet was the throne: its name came from the fact, that both families has a rose in their crests, in the one of the York a white one, while in the family of Lancaster’s a red one. It lasted for thirty years, from 1455 until 1485. We should think about György Szántó’s words, which can be read in the very readable, and even easy history of England (Maecenas, 1992.): “About the inner conflicts of the aristocracies that wore the roses, most of the English people could know as much as can be known today about the inner wars of factions of parties in the parliament. (Taking into special consideration the immaturity of newsagents. DMI) The real wars from the point of view of time and place, had a very small dimension, and only a few people were got involved... It cannot be told, that with the war of roses, that bloody and very long civil war would have been repeated, which burst out between Stephen and Queen Matild. This vision was formed, because that Tudor absolutism, which was put on throne after the end of the war of roses, could see aimfully their own dictatorship-like power got promoted that way. Shakespeare ... stepped on stage as the saviour of ideas of the absolutism of Elizabeth-era.”
Anyway, the two houses were the two branches of the same house of Plantagenet, but it was a problem. The heirs could argue about smaller pieces, and here they wanted to get the throne, the crown. VI. Henry, who was from the house of Lancaster, and during his childhood the noblemen were the rulers: the fought with each other, they imposed taxes, and crime got bigger during that time, the tension rose inside the society. Richard (another! exactly Richard III’s father), the Prince of York, wanted as a regent, that Henry VI, who is the descendant of Edward III’s fourth son, resigned from the throne on his behalf, as he is the descendant of the third son. That is how the war of roses started. Henry finally died in the Tower: Edward IV had him killed. (The society loved him, Shakespeare wrote a three parts long play about him, the two of it were translated by László Németh. As I have said, worth reading the trilogy, they are about the time before the era of Richard III, Richard was also there between the characters. It is worth, because we can see: they are also sinful in many things, who can raise condolence in us.) Henry VI’s wife, the cursing Anjou Margit – from the performance in 1969 I could only remember Miklós Gábor, who performed the main character, and Irén Psota, who was Margit, her enchanting course is kept on a recording too, in the past there was a series of programme called “Vastaps”. (There were not many recordings, but at least there was some.) And that is she, Lady Anna, who is the widow of Henry’s son, she was engaged by Richard, next to Henry’s coffin, who was her father-in-law, right at the end of the second scene of the second act. Anna’s husband was killed by Richard and his siblings, and in the play Richard states, that he killed also the woman’s father in a battle. In spite of all these, he wants to get married to he – and he does! It is a famous scene, in connection with it Sándor Petőfi, who hated the English, but admired Shakespeare (“he is the half of the creation on his own”), wrote in his critic in 1847 that “he has not got a partner in his grandeur”. Gábor Egressy chose this play as his showcase, which they performed with Péter Vajda’s translation, Szigligeti’s one is a later one in 1873. (Anyway Petőfi was also wrong, he said about the one in coffin to be Anna’s husband; he was wrong in connection with greater things too.) In reality the engagement could happen that way, as many other things, but Shakespeare in reality did not write a history book, but a play. In the end of which, the earl of Richmond appears, Tudor Henry at Bosworth has won over the others from York, Richard also dies (of course, in the play he was killed by the earl). Richmond becomes the new ruler with the name of Henry VII, as the first king of the house of Tudor, he did it with strong hands until 1509. He needed to be strong, as the members of the house of York did not accept their loss easily. Anyway, he got married to Edward IV’s daughter, York Elizabeth, and that way he connected the three noble families. Richmond does not appear, in any of the performances: in case of Maladype, Richard repeats his name with the knowledge of his loss for sure.
At the beginning of the play Edward IV is sitting on the throne (he reigned between 1461–1470 and 1471–1483; István Vas wrote his name as Edward). It is a sad thing on a throne where Richard wants to sit.
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The king has already been seriously ill, as it is told to Richard by the chamberlain, Lord Hastings, who has just got freed from the prison. They do not take care about him, maybe he can be moved against Clarence. Edward, with a last, childish and powerless gesture would like to reconcile those, who are angry at one another, maybe, those who hate each other. Rivers shakes hands with Hastings (“By heaven, my heart is purged from grudging hate;”), Hastings kisses Elizabeth’s hand, which is moved towards him, Dorset and Hastings hug each other, Buckingham also hugs Elizabeth’s followers, and he even promises, the entering Gloster asks peace from everybody: there is no anger in him, as God gives humility to him, as he says. This scene, in both performances, is comic as in a cabaret, as it is crystal clear, that enmity has not become smaller a little bit. (The line of cabaret becomes full on the stage of Radnóti, in the scene, in which from the characters’ actual political statements, we can learn at once, why they have chosen this play. So, well, then why... The jovial, servile and keen Lord Mayor – Zoltán Schneider – wants to ensure Richard about the support of the leaders of the town and of people, he welcomed the ones, who has come together with the loud cry of Welcome to London!, and he welcomes separately the “presented colleagues of the television and newspapers”. He tells after it: “My friends, we strongly hope, that Prince Gloster will answer with a yes to our ask and he accepts the crone. God helps us, come on England, come on the English people!” He even mentions a stadium... Exactly that way: “...a stadium will be named after me in my home village, I cannot do to them, that I will not be there.” There are effective series of jokes, but maybe – I cannot decide for sure – they are too much, too direct. However, it is true that they can ease the tension in us. Not the one in the viewers. But in the ordinary people.)As the queen and her family go out after the big reconciliation, Richard starts immediately talking against them. As the possible rivals must be put aside from his way, and at the same time he has to win supporters, who can strengthen his own position the most. Clarence must be killed, it has happened, others have to be eliminated, he has to get married to Lady Anna. His time has come: York sunshine can light finally by him. He cannot miss the opportunity.
The scenes about the proposal of Anna to be his wife, right at the beginning, in the second scene of the first act, in reality is the most brilliant one in drama literature, suddenly I can put next to it, just the dialogue of Maria and Elizabeth from Schiller’s Stuart Maria. From the actors’ point of view, it can be harder, as a hardly imaginable – if it can be imagined anyway – turn, an inner change has to be made believable, but both Eliza Sodró and Ágota Szilágyi can solve the scene brilliantly. Shakespeare gave himself the task to write a dialogue, where the woman hates the man, who wants to talk to her at the beginning, she does not even want to talk to him, as he has killed her husband and father-in-law, Henry VI, above all, Anna is following the coffin of the later one form the Saint Paul Cathedral in London to the church of Chertsey Abbey – this coffin is missing from both performance, do not get confused even more. Anna is not so friendly: “Go away!” and Richard has to turn it. He uses everything, in spite of threatening and accusation. He tries to be overly familiar, (“Sweet saint” in the original play), he refers to pity, he replies wisely, he flatters, tells lies, accuses her, calls her a liar, he is impudent, he flirts (“Your beauty was the reason of the acts...”), he admits his love, he offers to be her husband. Then Anna spits him on, which is a clear evident of her antipathy. But Richard does not back down, and he even uses a new tool: he holds his sword to Anna, she should stab him, if she does not love him. Does he take a risk? He knows that she will not do it. It is true. Richard even knows that he has won. He still needs some short sentences, and then Anna pulls on Richard’s ring. At the time of saying goodbye she is flirtatious. And she leaves to go to her aspirant’s palace...
So it is useful if a man has a good speech.
Even Richard is surprised by the effect. Alföldi’s Richard does not believe it. He does not even think it before!
Anna later, in the fourth scene tells about it: “my woman's heart /
Grossly grew captive to his honey words..."
Well, yes, he did.
In November 2004 in the National Theatre, they performed Shakespeare’s masterpiece according to Péter Valló’s memorable staging. The main character was János Kulka. I watched the performance, when Anna was not performed by Ági Szalóky but by Judit Schell. In her brilliant performance the sexual desire was dominant: Richard seduced her as a man, as a male, he grabbed her – which denied immediately Richard’s picture about himself: well, he can obviously plays the lover! In a part of the performance of Maladype, Ágota Szilágyi is wearing just a bra, and Kata Huszárik’s dress, who performs the queen, is also provocative. In the performance of Radnóti, Eliza Sordó’s Anna later hurts her genitals: she does not let Richard’s child be born.
Richard has a speech fight with Elizabeth too in the fourth act: she is the one, whose stepson has already been killed by him by then, and he tries to persuade her – new conception – to convince one of her daughters, to get married to him, to the king. Kata Huszárik’s Elizabeth may try to do it, in case of Adél Kovács it does not happen for sure. When Elizabeth leaves, Alföldi’s Richard rates her strongly: “Stupid bitch” - the original “Thou lump of foul deformity!” has been turned into it. But a Richard of our modern time would tell it, especially in case of Alföldi.
Richard to our ruin, can play anything, he can do anything, he can reach anything, for a while at least, he has talent, form, charisma and courage or insolence instead, for it. Neither Clarence nor Edward are careless, but he can easily cheat them! None of them tries to speak with the other one, both of them believe blindly in Richard! Who is truly evil anyway. I would mention another sentence with classical beauty from the Hungarian theatre history: “This man has black shit!” – Kálmán Nádasdy told about him, in his staging from 1947, he put on stage the whole text in the National Theatre; it could not be a short performance.
Alföldi’s Richard is even infantile sometimes. As it is said, “there is text for it”, he tells in the first act to Margit: “I am too childish-foolish for this world.” According to it, he sometimes throws flowers, then he complains about a little bit of cold, he sometimes arrives in pyjamas with Mickey Mouse on it to an important meeting, where they decide about the crowning of the Prince of Wales. From where, after some minutes, he has Hastings brought away: “Cut his head!” (How does he have lawful right to do it? Does he have it? Why does not anybody protest? Anyway, who dares to do it? Lovel and Ratcliff get the exercises to do it, they accept it without any word; Ratcliff was enthusiastic in case of the killing of Grey, Rivers and Vaughan, of the queen’s relatives in Pomfret too. Buckingham is Richard’s accomplice. The bishop of Ely cannot see or hear on his behalf, he sends people for the strawberries, which Richard wants, in Radnóti we can see them red on the table in minutes. Nobody protests here. Richard can do what he wants to.)
The picture of the act is impressive as the psychopath’s personality can finds joy in the way of taking no attention to the norms of society (however, in Shakespeare’s time, the killing seemingly had different judgement, as it has today, however, the killing of children was judged even then. Richard killed both Clarence and Edward’s children), in the deception and manipulation of the others. He even uses the tool of fake news – well, it is not a new phenomenon, of course, not! However, today it is much easier to spread fake news, frightening news in the world. Richard tells that Edward’s children are bastards, so they were not born by his lawful wife: „Moreover, urge his hateful luxury / And bestial appetite in change of lust...” And Edward is only his step-brother, only their mother is the same, who cheated her husband, who fought in France. So, he slanders his own mother too, who is still alive! So he even spreads that Anna, who is his wife then, is seriously ill, she is about to die. So she will also die. He changes the conception. He tells us, to the viewers the reason of it too: “I must marry my brother's daughter, / Or else my kingdom stands on brittle glass. / Murder her brothers, and then marry her!”
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In case of Maladype, Zoltán Balázs enters. He can be a viewer, who is late. He does not have hump, he does not limp, he is a nice, charming young man. We cannot think that he is evil. It happens. Are we unsuspicious? But it would be terrible to always live in suspicion! Balázs tells the monologue in an everyday voice, he is almost friendly; however, the text is very old, and sometimes bumpy. With the usage of Szigligeti’s translation, Sándor Zsótér makes the play timeless, he puts it into the surrounding of a laboratory. Mari Benedek’s costumes and Mária Ambrus’ pieces of set help him to do it. At the same time, he turns out attention a little bit towards the Hungarian history too, to the past and the present too. And the choice is a kind of tribute to the worthy and versatile nineteenth century, to the director of the National Theatre, who wrote a hundred and eleven plays, between them the Liliomfi... (I admit, I cannot understand the set: the scaffolding, which is used at buildings, remains a scaffolding for me; but it can divide the space, and it suits to the laboratory.) The atmosphere of anxiety is created by the unexpected sound effects, the unexpected rising of volumes, the unexpected cries and shouts, the bang of the trapdoor, which falls many times.In Radnóti Róbert Alföldi appears. His Richard is unpleasant for the first sight; his hair is unpleasant, and even his dress (costume: Fruzsina Nagy). Between the changes (the version of the text is made by Şerban and Daniela Dima, and the literary consultant, as I have said, Péter Závoda; Zsótér’s dramaturg as usual Júlia Ungár is) it is very important, that this performance does not start with the famous monologue, but with a part of the forth scene of the forth act, with the dialogue between Princess of York and Richard, between the mother and her son: "Art thou my son?" / "Ay, I thank God, my father, and yourself." But after the first two lines it also changes, back to the end of the third part of Henry VI: Richard’s words come from there, with László Németh’s translation, that “There is piece in my home. Both my brothers love me.” Here is sounds as “There is piece in my home...” and from “Let’s come here, Bess...”, we get “Let’s come here my little Elizabeth...”, and with it he starts the bitter frivolity nature of his words, which is there all through the performance. And there are some important words for Richard, in his long monologues from the second scene of the third act of the same play, in the end of which we can also hear Machiavelli’s name too. Now he only asks: “And am I them a man to be belov’d?”, and Alföldi repeats it many times. What kind of answer does he want? Would he like to get love? If he asks it, then he probably yes. Then he suddenly says: ”O fearful error in the mind to think!” And he states: “I'll make my heaven to dream upon the crown, / And, whiles I live, to account this world but hell...” He does not tell a word that what he will do if he wins. He sits on it, holds its arms, until he can. He thinks that he is suitable for it: “Well, I can smile and kill smilingly...” Yes, he can.
The showing of Richard’s personality is very enchanting: it is a perfect clinical picture. He gives us the creeps. But even more enchanting the showing of the acts, he does, he can do them besides his own characteristics, because his surrounding, for different reasons, lets him, leaves him, and even supports and helps him. As I have said, Richard III is study of society too, as a very good performance can do it too – as both of them, which are mentioned here.
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It is always easy to find assassins. All time, all society have its poor ones. Shakespeare shows two of them. They have no names – they have personality and identity. If we want, we can find the dialogue of the two killers, comic too, as the first assassin does not want to kill Clarence in his dream, “...because if he gets up tells that we have been coward”, the second one becomes unsure in the best moment and he does not stab either. Only the first one does, and in the end of a long dialogue they are arguing above the dead one. One of them regrets what he has done: “It makes me sick, such monstrous villainy.” He is not suitable for this profession. There is a right man for the killing of children too, a “dissatisfied noble man”, Tyrrel, who is offered by a squire in the original text - in Radnóti Ratcliff does - to Richard: "I know a discontented gentleman, / Whose humble means match not his haughty spirit: / Gold were as good as twenty orators, / And will, no doubt, tempt him to anything." He can temp him. In case of Shakespeare, he hires him. He is picky: he does not want his hands to be bloody. We learn from him that the two assassins are “effeminate amorous”, he cried because of condolence, when they was Edward’s children holding each other in their dream, then he strangled them with tearful eyes. The work is work. Tyrrel can expect a huge benefit. He does not have remorse for sure, especially because, he did not get his hands bloody. In case of Şerban he is the assassin. He states objectively: “A bloodier deed was never done in this land,”. The assassins of the murder are shocked – are getting shocked – by their act, Richard is not. However, he knows that – weak phrase! – he has chosen “dubious” methods. But it is too late to turn back. "But I am in / So far in blood that sin will pluck on sin." Tyrrel also talks about a “bloody king”, who he welcomes the next moment with the greatest humility: “Welcome you, my Lord.” He is the boss now, he has to be in good relationship with him.It is easy to find both unprincipled followers and loyal servants, even those who are close to his rank, who are loyal until it is also good to them. Lovel and Ratcliff fulfil the orders without any argument. The relatives, who are moved away, Grey, Rivers and Vaughan, do not live for long, as well as Hastings, his cut head is taken to their ruler as a nice gift.
It is harder to find a deserving ally, but there are some. Here is Prince Buckingham, who is also a relative, he is Richard’s nephew. He is a true partner, he is deserved to get into the game by Richard. After the big reconciliation of the family and after Richard’s words, which prove the queen and her family to be sinful Buckingham tells Richard, on his and lord Stanley’s behalf that: “We will attend you, your Grace.” (In case of Şerban he talks in first person singular. He does not share is.) He is in reality – after one of Stanley’s nightmares, in which a wild boar, Richard’s heraldic animal, broke his hat, and he would like to escape. He is afraid. Buckingham is not. When he leaves for Ludlow for the heir of the throne, after the king’s death, who is the king at the time, according to the English laws, he is just had to be crowned, he tells: "...by the way, / As next to place, I'll count the queen's proud kindred / From the prince's person to remove." (They talked about it outside the stage.) Richard calls him enthusiastically to be his “better ego”, “his nice relative”. Later, in the fifth scene of the third act, he shows his cards, at least some of them, he asks: “Come, cousin, canst thou quake, and change thy colour...” He can. They change immediately their common knowledge into practice, they form a scene in front of the just invited and arriving Lord Mayor about Hastings, the traitor, who has wanted to kill them... It will be the mayor’s task to share between people that Hastings deserved his fate. He also begs Richard to accept the crown finally. Buckingham remains by Richard, until he tells him that Edward’s children have to die. It is too much for him. Well, it is on the edge. He asks for his parts: the earldom of Hereford and the properties of the previous king, which Richard has promised to him. If he gets them, he agrees. He asks it at the wrong moment. He thinks, that he has got out of favour. He escapes. More exactly he escapes to Richard’s enemy, to Bretagne to Richmond, as well as the others do, more and more. And the support Richmond to come back home and fight for the crown. Catesby and Ratcliff are those who hold on.
Richard makes a terrible mistake, when he does not fulfil Buckingham’s ask and especially when he lets him escape. In the performance of Radnóti, he spectacularly humiliates him – pees on him – but then lets him go. And the hurt and already humiliated Buckingham runs: to Richmond. And above all, he does not do it alone: he collects an army...
There are those, who cannot recognise, what is going on around them. They are naïve. They believe in Richard and trust him. The cardinal, who first does not want to make the queen, who has escaped to Westminster, spend her younger son, who she has taken with herself, to the Prince of Wales, and then he backs down immediately not after Richard’s but Buckingham’s words. They can be the most interesting ones: who believe in the system in reality and do not recognise that they are living in tyranny. It is a shame that there are not many of these kind of figures in case of Shakespeare. There are some of course, who does not want to recognise what happens. Their own comfort and position are more important for them. As in the case of the bishop of Ely and his strawberries...
And finally there are some people, who hate Richard unforgivingly for a long time. They see through him. First of all, the frightening, cursing queen Margit, who has cursed almost everybody, and whose curses seem to be effective. (We can learn a lot about her too from Henry VI.) Queen Elizabeth, Richard has had two of her sons killed, not to become any of them a king. And which is the most horrible one, his own mother, Princes of York, who cursed him: “My pray will fight on your enemies’ side” . The first part of the forth scene of the forth act is shocking: the three women, who have stresses relationship with each other too, are connected by their hate towards Richard. But Richard have more and more those kinds of enemies, about whom, we just hear something, who collect army and join to Richmond. For a long time it is true, what is said by Buckingham, who has been captivated and taken to execute: “Sin will pluck on sin, and shame on shame.”, but this horrible process can be broken too.
Richmond, so Tudor Henry after the battle in Tewkesbury in 1471, went to Bretagne – now in 1985 we are two years after Richard’s coronation. He rightfully thought, that he had right for the throne: he was the only male descendant of the house of Lancaster. In the battle of Bosworth he defeated Richard, originally the play ends with his words: “peace starts living”, a new era begins, it is wonderful: Richmond, who gets on throne with the name of Henry VII, will have a grandchild, who will be Shakespeare’s ruler, Elizabeth, who was born from the marriage of Henry VIII and Boleyn Anna.
Zsótér and especially Şerban do not believe in this peace.
Richmond does not appear in any of these performances. With whom a new era could start anyway, is nowhere. In case of Zsótér’s performance, we cannot hear the closing monologue, in Şerban’s performance, Elizabeth tells it. King Edward’s words, from the Henry VI, which can be heard at the beginning of the performance – “There is peace in my home...” – turn out to be wrong soon, and they have not been true even for a moment. That is all about the ruler’s sense of reality. The circle, which begins with his words, is closed now. “Now civil wounds are stopp’d, peace lives again: / That she may long live here, God say amen!” In these performances it is not probable. And nothing would have been solved even if the Prince of Wales had been put on the throne: Edward’s children are silly in both performances, they are almost mad. There is no way out.
From Richmond, as a positive hero, Richard’s punishment is much more interesting, which is presented in both performances.
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Richard knows from the beginning that he is a villain, so he knows those values, according to which, he becomes that one, against which he turns, which he leaves so consciously. Or not?Here we should think about what György Csepeli has written in his critic about the performance of Maladype (Mozgó Világ, 2026.): “The prince only says, that he wants to be a villain, in reality, he wants power, in connection with which, we cannot talk about neither the moral scheme of wickedness nor of kindness.” Csepeli is one of the best social-psychologists on international level too, who has written a book with the title of The Anatomy of Power (Kossuth, 2013), and above all, as a state-secretary he was also the part of power – without this role, he did not write his book, as he said it. Then he goes on: “Max Weber tells about power, that it is »legitimate physical violence«, so with other words, it is the right for killing. He kills in his everyday life (or has someone killed), that man leaves the order of life, he commits a crime and loses his right to live. The situation is different in case of the sovereign ruler, who can kill and have someone killed, as it is said by Carl Schmitt, he is outside order, however, he is connected to it, as he decides, who are friends, who are necessary for the keeping of the order, and who are enemies, who threaten it. The power, is the situation of guiltless guilty, which has very strong attraction on those, whose ego cannot hold the yoke of order, and they want to form the order according to their thoughts. Some can do it, some cannot. Shakespeare’s case study is about an unsuccessful trial.”
It is hard to argue with György Csepeli, because of the incredible amount of his knowledge, but I have to, because I do not agree with him. (However, it is true that I have never been a state-secretary.) Richard wants power in reality, but he does not only tell that he will be a villain: he wants power so much, that he is ready to become a villain for it, as anyway he cannot get it. He tells it to the viewers at the beginning – why would he lie to us? We are his confidants. That question is more important, if the “moral scheme” of wickedness and kindness can be connected to power, is a sovereign ruler “outside” the order in reality, is he out, if he thinks like this, because he does not want to put on the yoke of order. (And of course: he is outside of which order, from where does this order come...) According to me no, the rules of the society can be connected to everybody, and if somebody does not accept them, as the evil ones from the 20. century did, then the society would punish them sooner or later. Just take Ceauşescu’s situation into consideration. Or the revolution of 56’.
I know, what I write is very sketchy, but I do not want to get into unknown place. Anyway Richard is punished, and both performances show it stressed. In his dream, the ones’ ghosts, who he killed (in Radnóti, they are put into bags, and seem to be a little bit silly), curse him now, (“Despair, and die!"), and we can even hear, that they bless Richmond, as he tells it himself, and his conscience – it is a strange word from his mouth – stings him. He knows, that he has committed crimes, he knows at the moment he does them, but what he does, is a sin. The first in the line was the act of putting Clarence into prison and the act of killing him – by the way, as an extra task, he was careful to make the seriously ill king Edward believe, that his brother was killed because of his reckless order. (We do not hear the giving of this order, only what Edward says, when Richard talks him about Clarence’s death: “Did he dies? But the order was withdrawn!” He does not even think about what could happen in reality.)
Richard’s words, which he says after getting up from a nightmare, are about complete confusion inside:
„What do I fear? Myself? There's none else by.
Richard loves Richard, that is, I am I.
Is there a murderer here? No. Yes, I am.
Then fly! What, from myself? Great reason why:
Lest I revenge. What, myself upon myself?
Alack, I love myself. Wherefore? For any good
That I myself have done unto myself?
O, no! Alas, I rather hate myself
For hateful deeds committed by myself.
I am a villain. Yet I lie; I am not.
Fool, of thyself speak well. Fool, do not flatter.
Some lines are missing, but I quote them:
My conscience hath a thousand several tongues,
And every tongue brings in a several tale,
And every tale condemns me for a villain.
And we can hear these:
"I shall despair. There is no creature loves me;
And if I die, no soul shall pity me."
Not only the circle of the history is closed, but soon Richard’s self circle too: “...am I a lovable one?” – he asked it at the beginning. He knows then that he is unable to be loved, but he stubbornly does not want to be loved. Here he is seemed to be confused that nobody loves him, and maybe it has confused him so far too. He wanted to be a villain – then he has become. (He returns, twice, the word of villain.) What has he reached with it? Or he must have been even more skilful?
His torn monologue, which is said not to us now, but to himself (anyway, others can be understood that way), makes us remember János Kádár’s last speech, which he said on 12th April 1989 on the closed meeting of Central Committee of MSZMP. Maybe Imre Nagy was the one, who appeared in his dreams.
There are of course, politicians, who are without conscience, and who are unscrupulous, who do not regret anything, as they think in the last moment too that they have nothing to regret. It is remarkable but of course, it can be explained, if in the political system of the world Donald Trump could appear. He is not alone of course, here is Duterte, Erdoğan, Putin, and none of them can know anything about the remorse or shame. I can mention many Hungarian politicians too, we have experienced extreme things since 2010 and the change is still far away, we cannot see the possibility. But I think that sins are sins in spite of all these. And fortunately we can see those politicians too on the international level and in Hungary too, who want good for the society, which they lead, or they would like to lead.
Richard is not seemed to be the one, who regrets his acts, and finally he even gets himself together, and leaves to the battle that way. He does not win this one, no matter how hard he fights. („Daring an opposite to every danger” – Catesby says it with devotion in the original text.) If he won, would rule on the same way, as he has done before. Or even harder, if it is possible anyway.
A question can be, that what causes his fall. Another question can be, but not inside the play, would he fall if Richmond did not fight against him. If he had fulfilled Buckingham’s tiny desire, and Buckingham would have joined to Richmond’s side? György Csepeli talked about Richard’s figure in Borbála Ferenczi’s book of speech, with the title of Fate-chooser, (Kossuth, 2018) about his own career as a politician. He said that the owner of power gets further, and rid of those who warn him about his different failures. “Those who do not give any feedbacks, are the members of the court anyway: the followers, who are depended on you. Obviously they will not tell, if you do it wrong. The mirror disappears, and a picture is formed in you, which can cause Richard III’s death: these is not anybody, who can tell that that is all, no more to do.” So maybe, we cannot do anything without punishment, even if it seems to be that way for long.
The newer question is that how long he could rule. Inside the play there is not any answer to it, and it does not turn out clearly, why does Richmond listen to the English people, who support him. Why he goes on the sea, does he want to stop tyranny, does he want to be a king, or does he want to be a king by stopping tyranny, and if he becomes a king, does not he turn to be a tyrant himself too. The play indicates that he will be a good ruler. In both performance there is not any release.
Anyway, at the beginning of the 21st century, we can know, that the sunshine of York – or Lancaster – just rarely and for a short period of time can change into shining summer the permanent winter of our bad mood.
The critic was published in Criticai Lapok 2018/11–12. in a shorter version.
(translated by: Veronika Fülöp)