14 January 2019. The tragedy of King Richard the Second at the Almeida.

Frankly, I booked this because the lead role was to be played by Simon Russell-Beale. While he validated the choice, the direction by Joe Hill-Gibbins did not really work for me. The 'set' consisted of a dark metallic cage; the actors threw buckets of 'blood', soil and water so that the stage ended up as something of a quagmire; some actors played more than one part; and the text had been severely pruned to 100 minutes. The play itself and the fine speeches struck me as deserving more.