Page 71 - King Lear: The Cambridge Dover Wilson Shakespeare

Ixvi K I N G L E A R
In the early years of this century few revivals took
place in London, but of late they have greatly increased.
In 1909 the Haymarket showed the play from 8 Septem-
ber with Norman McKinnel and Ellen O'Malley. Nine
years later the Old Vic gave the first of its several Lears,
when Ben Greet produced it on 2 5 February 1918 with
Russell Thorndike and Mary Sumner, reviving the
older practice by giving the Fool to Sybil Thorndike. In
1920, from 29 November, Robert Atkins was the pro-
ducer and acted the King with Mary Sumner again as
Cordelia; Wilfrid Walter designed the settings, and the
play, little cut, lasted 3§ hours. 1 The following year he
repeated the production for the company. In May 1928,
Ernest Milton played the leading part in a full-length
King Lear produced by Andrew Leigh; Gordon Crosse*
thought him at the time the best Lear he had seen since
Irving. Meanwhile the play had been staged for the
Phoenix Society at the Regent Theatre in 19 24 (Hubert
Carter and Gwen Ffrangcon-Davies), while Nugent
Monck at his Maddermarket Theatre, Norwich, had
shown it in 1926 in an unlocalized setting with one ten
minutes' interval. In April 1931 John Gielgud acted
his first Lear, Harcourt Williams producing, for the
Old Vic; Ralph Richardson played Kent and Patricia
McNabb Cordelia. His next, also for the Old Vic, was
in 1940 with Lewis Casson (not yet Sir Lewis) and
Harley Granville-Barker as producers,^ when Casson
acted Kent, Cathleen Nesbitt and Fay Compton were
Goneril and Regan, and Jessica Tandy was Cordelia.
The text was almost uncut. Meanwhile William Devlin
had appeared as Lear for the Old Vic in 1936 (Ion
Swinley as Kent and Vivienne Bennett as Cordelia); he
1
Gordon Crosse, p. 55.
a
P. 64.
3 For the partnership see C. B. Purdom, Harley Granville-
Barker (1955), pp. 261-3.