(Ben Brantley’s article appeared in The New York Times, 2/20; via Pam Green.)
Glenda Jackson will return to Broadway in “King Lear,” while Adam Driver takes on his first starring role there in “Burn This.”
Expect the canyons of Broadway to echo with shouts and screams this spring — and moaning and groaning and lamentation of an exceptional amplitude and ferocity. And I’m not referring to ticket buyers who have just registered what an orchestra seat will set them back, or not only that.
Rather, I’m referring to two stars, much celebrated for their combustible presences on stage and screen, who will be taking on parts in which being able to generate high dudgeon at high volume is a primary job requirement. That would be the British actress Glenda Jackson, in the rage-filled title role of Shakespeare’s “King Lear,” and the unlikely American heartthrob Adam Driver, who is portraying what might be described as an emotional arsonist in the first Broadway revival of Lanford Wilson’s 1987 drama “Burn This.”
As is the case with many of this season’s main-stem offerings, the road to New York for this “King Lear” and “Burn This” has hardly been a straight line. They’re each arriving later than was originally anticipated — and in somewhat altered form.
