Spider King

By T.E. Kalem

RICHARD III

by William Shakespeare

Richard III is called a "hellhound," an "elvish-mark'd, abortive, rooting hog," "a bottled spider" and a "poisonous bunch-back'd toad."

A playgoer attending the Delacorte Theater in Central Park for Joseph Papp's first summer offering will soon perceive that Kevin Kline does not fit that description. It is not a question of some malformation of body `a la Elephant Man, it is a question of a cancerously aberrant soul. Richard III lies somewhere between Iago, with his "motiveless malignity," and Macbeth, who has "supp'd full of horrors" in his naked, unbridled lust for power.

The special quality of Richard is not his glacial cruelty or that he has some half a dozen people butchered to achieve the crown but that his mere presence instills fear in all, generates a nervous electric tension with every crooked step. Even his broad streak of sardonic humor (said to be shared by Stalin) is chilling.

Kline's conception of the role is that of an oldtime silent-movie villain who relishes his villainy and wants everyone else to relish it. Thus his performance takes the form of a prolonged aside to the audience, missing only the knowing wink. What Kline lacks in gravity, he makes up in charm. His rash, stunning proposal to share the bed of Lady Anne (Madeleine Potter), made over the coffin of her father-in-law, whom Richard has slain after murdering her husband, meets with implausible success partly because Kline makes seduction irresistible.

In an uneven cast, Marian Seldes is formidable as the bereft Queen Margaret. She utters her prophecies and anathemas as if the blood of Cassandra were coursing through her veins. The rest of the production could use a splash of it

--By T.E. Kalem This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.