Summary 
Strong drama staged with black-box minimalism but strikingly lit, with a memorable gender-bent performance of the lead role as a creepy, disease-ridden monster. Interesting racial casting and uniformly strong supporting performances - especially Margaret the curser - bolster the production, which concludes with dramatically effective use of ghosts as Richard's undoing at Bosworth Field.
Design
Directed by Miles Potter. Designed by Peter Hartwell. Lighting design by Kevin Fraser. Compositions by Marc Desormeaux. Sound design by Peter McBoyle. Fights directed by Daniel Levinson.
Cast
David Ferry (Edward), Yanna McIntosh (Elizabeth), Teddy Gough (Prince Edward), Jeremy Harttrup (Prince Richard), Michael Spencer-Davis (George), Seana McKenna (Richard), Roberta Maxwell (Duchess), Bethany Jillard (Anne), Martha Henry (Margaret), Dion Johnstone (Grey), Nigel Bennett (Hastings), Andrew Gillies (Stanley), Wayne Best (Buckingham), Sean Arbuckle (Catebsy), Oliver Becker (Ratcliffe), Paul Fateaux (Tyrrel/Thomas), Gareth Potter (Henry).
Analysis
The Stratford Shakespeare Festival's Richard III is staged within the black-box Tom Patterson Theatre, upstage space blocked by a crimson curtain and red-and-white drapery to the sides. Black metal railing lines the gallery, and choral chanting echoes as the audience takes its seats. Director Miles Potter begins with a celebratory dumb show from 3 Henry VI showing Edward winning the crown and hurling a blonde-haired doll of Margaret over the back of the stage. When the victorious Yorks exit through the curtain upstage, a spot light finds Seana McKenna's Richard 1.1 - "now 'tis the winter of our discontent" - with long stringy black hair, bald spots apparent on her skull. McKenna's Richard is far from feminine, with the usual attributes - dressed in black, limping and hunchbacked, favoring a withered arm - but in this production more an androgynous embodiment of evil, something like the Penguin in Batman comic books, diseased and distempered, angry red blotches like bruises upon her pallid face. The lights rise at her proclamation to "be a villain" and she ends her soliloquy - "dive, thoughts" - to give her brother George a reptilian embrace.
McKenna's performance builds slowly, better at first in two-faced interaction than in confessional soliloquy, and she oozes evil wit - "when men are ruled by women" - as well as expert comic timing: "I run before my horse to market." The improbable 1.2 wooing of Anne begins with the Princess in a funeral march behind a shrouded corpse upon a stretcher. Anne, a gracefully tall blonde as if McKenna's ghastly Richard in opposite, wears an ivory gown beneath a light green wrap, and she is soft color and fragile beauty against Richard's misshapen darkness. Anne weakens, becoming less shrill and more conspiratorial, and when she kneels beside the shroud, she does not push away Richard's hand at her cheek. Anne rises in anger to spit in Richard's face, but McKenna's manipulative prince wipes away tears as well, and when she raises a knife, Richard cries out, "nay, do not hesitate!" despite the lack of hesitation from Anne. McKenna's Richard overwhelms Anne's fragile state of mind, dismissing her accusations and insults - "that was in thy rage" - and from her knees Anne takes Richard's hand to accept a ring. After Anne marvels at Richard with school-girl awe - "so penitent!" - and exits, the wooing is a success, and McKenna's Richard limps downstage for a triumphant crow.
Yanna McIntosh's stately Queen Elizabeth, wearing a green-trimmed red robe that hearkens Christian holidays, and her allies are racially cast - she and Rivers, Dorset, and Grey all dark-skinned - in an interesting choice by Potter that points to some bigotry in Richard's motivations. They present little difficulty for McKenna's Richard, although Martha Henry's bitterly eloquent Margaret - arriving 1.3 between the upstage curtains - makes Richard spin and look away. Henry's Margaret appeals in vain to Buckingham in a searing performance, but he turns his back to deny her - "nothing I respect, my lord" - and Potter segues to the 1.4 execution of George. The assassination scene plays with an odd lightness, the murderers almost comical - the bane of Titus Andronicus on this same stage, but more an aberration here in Richard III - and a scene that could be and should be chilling and painfully sad - religious George made aware of his brother's venom, then stabbed and drowned - is instead just an insight into the York prowess at manipulating people.
Potter's 2.1 reveals Edward as something akin to Richard in hideous disease, a syphilitic King with long gray hair obscuring his face, his body hunched with pain, his voice hoarse and weak. McKenna's Richard takes the stage with masterful confidence, both the character and the performance rising rapidly, and Richard runs roughshod over everyone with her hubris - "it is death to me to be at enmity...I hate it" - and pious deceits: "I thank my God for my humility." McKenna's Richard knocks over a chair in a plea for George when she knows he has already been executed, and Richard's meteoric rise brings brother Edward correspondingly down. Edward shows quaking anger at George's murder, Elizabeth seated uneasily behind him, and he suffers a violent pain in his side, begins to collapse, staggers a bit, and does. With McKenna's masterful sense of diabolical comedy and theatrical cunning - she marches upstage to yank the curtain closed as King Edward is helped offstage - the production reaches a delicious peak.
McKenna's Richard is obviously abhorrent to others: the Duchess begrudgingly blesses her son 2.2, but cannot bear to touch her only living son, and when the young Prince arrives, he mocks Richard by acting like a manic monkey, leaping onto Richard's hunched back, only to be spilled to the stage when Richard twists away. Ominous signs abound, from a Prince wishing for "more uncles" in 3.1 to Richard's "chop off his head...or something we shall determine" confidence 3.2 to Buckingham. The production reaches interval 3.3 with Dorset and Grey barefoot in a spot light at center stage, bearing their necks before three hooded guards and Ratcliffe brandishing a sword. The blows fall before a blackout, with Richard appearing to approvingly observe from upstage.
Potter's second half of Richard III moves quickly to the showdown at Bosworth Field. Potter uses the leading scenes to create memorable stage images, such as a giggling Catesby blocking the flight of Hastings 3.4, then tripping the "traitor" as he exits to be beheaded, or McKenna's Richard bending to study the bloody sack that contains Hastings' head, poking at it and prodding it like a curious child before dropping the bag with a thud at the feet of the Lord Mayor. McKenna's Richard shines, happy with the deceit of the townspeople 3.5, then manically sad at their reluctance, pious in feigned hesitation to assume the crown - "will you enforce me?" - then whipping a prayer book aside when the ploy is complete. Richard's malevolence becomes more physical as McKenna seizes the hesitating Buckingham by the arm 3.4, snaps impatient fingers at Ratcliffe 4.2, takes the murderous Tyrrel by the chin 4.3, and kisses Elizabeth's cheek gently 4.4 before grabbing her and kissing her full on the mouth. Potter follows Richard's kingly assertions - "I wish the bastards dead" causes Anne to twist away from him in her throne - with the 4.4 denunciation by Margaret. Henry's Margaret emerges upstage - "I had a husband until Richard killed him" - and her bitter diatribe enthralls - "these English wars will make me smile in France" - drawing spontaneous applause from the audience and an angry near-drawing of a sword by McKenna's Richard.
Potter cuts 4.5 and uses a brief 5.2 to introduce the tall, blond hero Richmond as Richard's handsome Lancastrian rival. The armies assemble at Bosworth Field, Richard's men in black downstage, Richmond's army in gray chainmail upstage. Richmond kneels to pray as McKenna's Richard writhes in nightmares upon a scarlet sleeping-mat. The ghosts of Richard's victims climb onstage from the gutters, all wearing flowing white shirts over black pants, with darkened eyes in whitened faces, their voices amplified. The ghosts, in glaring overhead lights, condemn Richard - "despair and die" - and turn to bless Richmond - "awake and win the day" - Anne moving close to Richard's face and one of the smothered Princes whispering into his ear. McKenna's Richard screams herself awake - "coward conscience!" - facing a gloomy morning, with the ghosts facing her from upstage - standing, silent, staring - as Richmond awakes in golden light, refreshed: "victory!"
Potter's conclusion is simple but expertly realized, quick skirmishes enacted to loud music, the ghosts unmoving as McKenna's Richard panics, her "a horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse" a gut-wrenching plea. The 5.5 finale plays in sudden slow motion and yellow light, McKenna's Richard confronted by both Richmond and the ghosts of her victims. The eight ghosts emit an amplified exhalation as if cursing and poisoning Richard at the same time. They move to block and misdirect her sword strikes, then remove the crown to startle her, and they disarm her to render her defenseless as Richmond strikes a mortal blow from behind. As Richard recoils and falls, the ghosts catch her as action returns to full speed. Stanley retrieves the crown from the tiny ghost of Prince Edward as Richmond vows to unite the white rose with the red. Potter's production - buoyed throughout by McKenna's memorably malignant Richard - ends as Richmond drops to his knees in thanks: "peace lives again."
Note: A version of this article was edited and published in Shakespeare Bulletin, Vol.30, No.2, Summer 2012.