King Lear
★★★★★ Unmissable
Pleasance Courtyard (Venue 33): Thur 14 – Sun 24 Aug 2025.
Review by Rebecca Mahar.
Pip Utton is back for a thirty-first year at the Fringe with his new monodrama King Lear, at the Pleasance Courtyard for the final two weeks of the fringe only.
This latest foray into the world Shakespeare, which had its world premiere earlier this summer at Prague Fringe, is a concise and all-consuming adaptation of one of his thorniest plays.
Pip Utton as King Lear. Promotional image by Marjolein Mooij.
King Lear centres around its aging monarch’s decision to ask his three daughters to profess the depth of their love for him in exchange for the largest share of his kingdom in their inheritances. Goneril, the eldest, and Regan, the second, flatter Lear in the way he desires.
But his youngest daughter and favourite, Cordelia, says that she cannot with words express her love, that she loves her father according to her bond and duty to him, and that she must also share her love with her future husband.
Infuriated, Lear disinherits Cordelia, before retiring from his throne to live with a retinue of a hundred knights, supported by his two supposedly faithful daughters.
bejewelled with rose hips
As the audience files in, Utton is seated on a box on the stage, clad all in white, weaving a crown of foliage to the background of birdsong, which he intermittently directs and faintly imitates. When he places the crown on his head his brow is bejewelled with rose hips; a walking stick, lovingly caressed, rests against his shoulder, and his expression is placid.
But then the lights come down with the sound of a storm, and Utton’s face melts into lines of distress; he arises, paces slowly as the lights fade back to clarity, and with shaking hands reaches out to dispense green sprigs and wisdom to individuals in the audience. At length he fixes on an elderly gentleman. “Do you have daughters, sirrah?” he asks, “And do you love them all? …I have no daughters, sir.”
the rot established in a single line
The storm in Lear’s mind becomes evident in this moment, the rot established in a single line, before Utton’s Lear even begins to tell his story. As he does embark on the story, it becomes clear that Utton has jettisoned everything but what matters most to Lear himself: his relationship with his daughters, whether he realises it or not.
All other machinations of the original are peripheral to Lear’s journey through entitled anger, confusion, loneliness, and the final despair that has been called his madness.
In his adaptation, Utton has carefully chosen the most vital pieces of the story to his pursuit of telling Lear’s psychological story, clipping out the necessary bits of Shakespeare’s play— as well as adding a few of his own, and bits from elsewhere in the canon.
“This is not Lear,” Utton proclaims cheekily, early on, after asking the audience if they know who he is, “this is Lear,” he holds up a crown, metal and fabric in contrast to the greenery that garlands his head, “and this: the hollow crown that rounds the mortal temples of a king…I monarchize, strike fear in hearts, and kill with looks.” This grafting of Richard II into Lear is an appropriate addition, drawing a connection to another of Shakespeare’s hubristic kings who met a tragic end, full of self-reflection that came too late.
a brilliant condensation
King Lear is a brilliant condensation and mashup of its source material, tightly focused and emotionally intelligent, performed with complete commitment by Utton.
This Lear does not try to paint its king as underserving of criticism, showing his injustice as much as the injustices done to him. It is a full picture of a man and the fallout of his choices, affecting not only he, but those he loved most.
Utton’s performance is relentless, from its stillness to its shouts, driving towards a foregone conclusion that lets no one off the hook: himself, his Lear, or his audience.
Pip Utton’s King Lear is a masterclass in monodrama, in tragedy, in adaptation, and in persevering until the time is right to play a role. Break, heart, if you miss this show.
Running time: One hour (no interval).
Pleasance Courtyard (Baby Grand), 60 Pleasance EH8 9TJ (Venue 33).
Thursday 14 – Sunday 24 August 2025.
Daily: 12.30pm.
Tickets and details: Book here on EdFringe.com.
Book here on EdFest.com.*
Pip Utton website: www.putco.uk
Facebook: @pip.utton
*affiliate link.
ENDS
