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| A Forty-Minute King Lear by Shakespeare, abridged Bill Tordoff |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 13. Minimum Female roles = 3. Minimum total with doubling = 16. Minimum total without doubling = 23. Chorus. As usual with Shakespeare, the characters are male-heavy. Also as usual, you can cast it how you like! |
| Run Time | Around 40 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | Abridgement of William Shakespeare's 'King Lear', with the original text cut down to 40 minutes or so.
(The abridgement is copyrighted, so we charge for scripts and copying rights, but performances are royalty-free.) |
| Synopsis | The king proposes to retire and divide his kingdom amongst his daughters. The elder two, Goneril and Regan, are happy to sweet-talk their father and go along with his plans - just until they have power. Cordelia, the youngest, loves her father, but refuses to flatter him, and, as a result, is banished. Soon the elder daughters take power and dishonour their father. Edmund, illegitimate son of the Duke of Gloster, aids Goneril and Regan, but becomes a focus for their rivalry. With Lear cast out, there is war between Cordelia and her sisters. Playing-out the themes of pride, deceit and jealousy, all ends tragically. |
| Price | For scripts and live performance rights, please click on the Price Link to find the cost. For scripts and lockdown videos/streaming rights, click here |
| Click here to read the script or Click here for more details. |
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