 This is Reno magazine writer Dana Nollsch attended our preview night performance of King Lear and wrote up a glowing review, with special call-outs to the production's costuming, action scenes, and the all-around brilliance of Scott Rankin as The Fool. Russia in the 1500s provides a great setting for drama and violence. This is Good Luck Macbeth’s version of Shakespeare’s great tragedy, “King Lear.” The dialog is intense as you would expect from a Shakespeare play. The action is equally intense as well. What struck me from the start was the costuming — absolutely brilliant! It is very colorful and very fitting for this production. Full of action, fights and stunts, this is a bit bloody but deliciously so. Trust me, you will not be bored with GLM’s version of King Lear. For me, Scot Rankin stole the show playing The Fool with such in such a delightfully mesmerizing way. His performance is worth the price of admission alone
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A King, A Fool, and a Devious Servant are today's Game of Thrones inspiration for King Lear4/21/2016 The last of our Game of Thrones inspiration for King Lear characters is for three very different men.  The Fool is Lear's confidante, truth-teller, and the only person permitted to speak openly with the mercurial king. He keeps the ill Lear in temper out of a sense of loyalty, even though The Fool is not of Lear's kingdom nor his people. A foreign captive brought to court, his wits and intelligence spared his life, but in return he was made to be a clown and a tool of amusement for Lear's court. One of Cordelia's only true friends, the deeply sad Fool came a bit undone when she left, as he watched Lear spiral into madness without his beloved daughter to keep him in check. Much like the former nobleman Dontos Hollard is made to be a Fool for King Joffrey in Game of Thrones, helping Sansa to escape out of a sense of love and pity, Lear's Fool is a nobleman from a great house in a foreign country, desperately sad and clinging to the last vestiges of life he has left.  Scheming, devious, and oddly loyal, the manservant of King Lear's eldest daughter Goneril is out for himself and the riches his loyalty might bring. His planning and plotting with Goneril are partly duty, partly social climbing, and the promise of riches and power are too much for him to turn down. But who is really doing the plotting, and who is truly in control of the scheme? Hmmm...me thinks Oswald is very much House Lannister in this regard.  Cordelia's husband, the King of France sees her for the truthful and honest person she is, and when she is disavowed and exiled, marries her for her sense for true love and loyalty. He is a King who can see the goodness in people, and is rational enough to see through the chaos and machinations of the unstable Lear family. Much like the upright Stannis Baratheon, the King of France knows goodness when he sees it. But will his gamble pay off.....?
Tonight Ashley took to the skies and soared in her role of The Pilot, under the brilliant direction of her co-pilot/director Joe Atack. Special thanks to Scott Rankin for set design and construction, and Luke Stiller for stage managing.
If you missed tonight's performance, you can purchase tickets at the link below for Friday and Saturday's show.
Over beers we asked "Clown Bar" cast member Scott Rankin what he thought the quintessential noir film of the 1950's was, and he responded "Night of the Hunter." A fantastic mixture of stark realism, Germanic expressionism, and American gothic, the movie is a brilliant good-and-evil parable, with "good" represented by a couple of farm kids and a pious old lady, and "evil" literally in the hands of a posturing psychopath. Robert Mitchum was never creepier than he was in this film as a child-hunting preacher, with Shelley Winters as the unsuspecting mother he marries, and Lillian Gish as the deeply religious matron of a home for abandoned children. Fun fact: the "Love" and "Hate" tattoos adorning the knuckles of many a Renoite come directly from this film.
Come see Scott Rankin, master of noir, as "Giggles" in Clown Bar.
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AuthorsChristopher Daniels is the current Managing Director of GLM Theatre and a bright shining light upon the stage. Archives
February 2019
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