The Lion in Winter

Treachery, lechery, and traitorous behavior. What family doesn’t have its ups and downs? Using smartly written dialogue and comic repartee, this story concerns the interpersonal dynamics and political wrangling of King Henry; his wife Eleanor, whom he has kept imprisoned in a tower for the past ten years; and their three sons, who are vying for the privilege of being named heir to the English throne. Eleanor, who has been let out of prison to celebrate Christmas with her family, favors Richard as heir, while Henry favors John. To complicate matters, the young King Philip II of France has arrived to remind Henry of a treaty he signed many years earlier, promising to marry his heir to Philip’s sister Alais. However, Alais has been Henry’s mistress for the past seven years, and Henry is hesitant to marry her off to any of his sons. With themes exploring the dysfunctional family, political maneuvering, war and peace, as well as aging, death, inheritance, and posterity, the principle characters plot, scheme, conspire, and counter-plot between each other, with the deep-seated emotional ties between them getting played out in the political arena.