It’s a new look for a still-menacing king
For 429 years, actors have been striding onstage to proclaim: “Now is the winter of our discontent.”
Laurence Olivier and Ian McKellen did it in movies of Shakespeare’s “Richard III.” Al Pacino, Mark Rylance, Jose Ferrer and others did it on Broadway. There have been at least 21 productions on Broadway, maybe 21 zillion in England.
Most of the stars have (like the real King Richard III) been male and white. “Four-and-a-half centuries of white dudes – I mean, let’s shake it up a little,” Danai Gurira said to the Television Critics Association.
That’s what she did in a New York Central Park show, which will air at 9 p.m. Friday (May 19) on PBS’ “Great Performances.” Gurira(shown here) – best known as Odeye, the African warrior leader in “Black Panther” movies – is Richard. Read more…