King Lear, Retold - Harrogate Theatre

With her warm, accessible style, passionate command of Shakespeare’s verse and startlingly powerful physicality, Debs Newbold’s award-winning storytelling will catapult you deep into the world of Shakespeare’s epic tragedy in King Lear, Retold.

Tell me my daughters, which of you... doth love us most?

An old king, afraid to be old. A daughter abandoned for speaking plainly. Two sisters warped by ill-treatment. A kingdom in turmoil. When Lear resigns his position by dividing his kingdom in three, he puts an outrageous test to his daughters. Their answers are not all that he expected. What he discovers about himself he does not wish to know.

Deeply felt and often uproariously funny, King Lear, Retold makes Shakespeare available to everyone in a performance that has all the power and grace of the original text, presented in a charismatic, thoroughly modern style. Created for a sell-out show at Hay Literary Festival, toured internationally and performed to acclaim at Shakespeare’s Globe, this is a thrilling, compelling solo performance.

‘Spellbinding and wonderful’ - Hay Literary Festival

★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ‘ one unfeasibly talented woman’ - Views From the Gods

★ ★ ★ ★ ‘ she pulls down the spirit of Shakespeare’ - StageTalk Magazine