This is London (Evening Standard online)23.March.2000
Ralph will make a rich Richardby Linus Roache
If you decide to do Richard II and Coriolanus, and you're playing
Bolingbroke and Aufidius, you want to be opposite someone who is
really quite amazing. Ralph Fiennes is. He is so focused and
fantastic to be on stage with. And when I look around there are some
real heavyweights involved - such as Oliver Ford Davies Duke Of
York/Menenius), Barbara Jefford (Duchess Of York/Volumnia), David
Burke (John Of Gaunt/Cominius), and great newcomers too.
I played Richard II in '93 at the Royal Exchange in Manchester,
and once before at the RSC. Ralph was working at the RSC too, and we
used to talk about Richard a lot. It is a play that fascinates me,
because it is a play about power - as well as a personal journey. To
me it is not so much a political play - it's about a spiritual
journey for a man. You see Richard go from having everything to
nothing, then watch someone else rise up - but when they get power they start to
decay. Coriolanus I don't know at all. Never seen it, or read it.
The two plays may talk about some of the same issues, but the drive of
the two plays is entirely different.
The Almeida has decided to hold the event at the former Gainsborough
Film Studios. When I first went there with director Jonathan Kent I
realised how wild and ambitious the project is. Hitchcock shot many
of his early films there, and Shakespeare began acting and writing
only half a mile away. The building is like an empty cathedral. It's
not like going to a theatre you have visited 100 times before -- you
are making a special journey to this extraordinary building.
Hopefully the shows will live up to expectations.
Coriolanus, previewing from Thur 1 Jun, opens Wed 14 Jun,
Gainsborough Studios, Poole Street, N1 (020-7359 4404).
Now Playing: Almeida at Gainsborough Studios From Mar 30, Mon-Fri
7.30pm, Sat, 7.45pm, mats Sat 7.45pm, ends Jul 22 £3.50-£30
(Thanks to Antonieta, who sent this to me! Mari)