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STC's <I>King Lear</i> Starring Stacy Keach Extends Until July 26 - 10:15PM on 7/11/2009
Highly sexualized treatment of Shakespeares great work dwarfs an amusing pyrotechnical, but misguided portrayal by Mr. Keach, who opens the first scene by grabbing the buns of his daughter Regan with lascivious glee.
The settings and sidebars include the taking of soft and hard drugs; and the violence is prolonged and homo-erotic, featuring strangling and smothering. It is an American take on German Expressionism, complete with heavy metal costumes and rap. Lears descent into madness is capped with a tasteless Hora dance.
Keach is a great actor ; but the press sugggests that he was involved in the thematics and staging. It is sad to see him so involved in an all-too-typical attempt at the anti-Puritanism theatrics which passes for drama in the American theater. Unhappily, this production is cartoonish in the vein of Mike Hammer.
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