Set in a highly militarized version of a 21st-century London, the sovereign King Lear calls his family together one evening in order for him to announce the division of his kingdom among his three daughters. The two elder daughters, Regan and Goneril, make open statements about their allegiance to and love for their father and receive each a share of the kingdom. The king's youngest daughter Cordelia, however, finds the act of making such a verbal statement superficial and declines to make a comparable declaration. As a result, she is refused her share of the inheritance, which is now entirely divided between her two elder sisters, and becomes a bride to the French King without dowry.

In a short period of time thereafter, Lear is dispossessed of all his possessions and retinue after Regan and Goneril take power. Edmund in the meantime abuses his brother Edgar's trust in order to gain his father's trust and confidence and has Edgar effectively banished from home and court. Lear's mind begins to waver and for a time he must survive on his own, disowned and starving, between the castles and strongholds of his former kingdom. Eventually, Cordelia returns with military reinforcements by way of her new marriage and England is reduced to civil war. Cordelia's troops are beaten and Cordelia is killed soon after reuniting with her father. Edgar in the meantime has returned to challenge Edmund to armed combat and mortally wounds Edmund before Lear returns to the scene with the body of the dead Cordelia. Regan and Goneril are then dispatched and killed in order to return England to peace and end the civil war. Lear dies of exhaustion at the scene of the death of his three daughters.

The bodies of the three dead sisters are collected and placed on a war-time pull cart, and Lear's dead body is added to the pull cart. The Duke of Kent and Edgar are left to bury the four bodies and to start to rebuild a savaged wartime landscape. It is the wartime landscape left in the wake of the civil war which has just ended following the consequences caused by Lear's previous and ill-fated division on his lands and possessions among his daughters.

In October 2017, the BBC commissioned a new adaptation of the Shakespeare play in a co-production with Amazon Studios, starring Anthony Hopkins as the title character, with Emma Thompson, Emily Watson and Florence Pugh as his daughters. Filming began in the same month in Stevenage.^[2][3] A "first look" image was distributed in February 2018.^[4]

Scenes were also filmed in various locations in Dover, Kent, such as at Dover Castle, Samphire Hoe, and Abbot's Cliff.^[5]

Critical response edit

The review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes reported an approval rating of 91% based on 22 reviews, and an average rating of 7.7/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Led by dual mesmerizing performances from Sir Anthony Hopkins and Dame Emma Thompson and rounded out by a solidly stocked ensemble, this King Lear is a highly watchable adaptation."^[6] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a normalized score of 76 out of 100, based on 6 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".^[7]

Sam Wollaston of The Guardian commended Hopkins' performance as Lear, deeming him "shouty, vulnerable and absolutely mesmerising" and wrote that "Shakespeare on television – a box it wasn't designed for and doesn't necessarily fit – isn't always successful. It only works if it's not just a play on the telly, but something in its own right, too, with its own identity. This one achieves that, with pace and modernity."^[8] The Wall Street Journal's John Anderson also commended Hopkins' performance, writing that he enjoyed watching him "gnash his teeth, wail and go gloriously mad opposite one of the best supporting casts imaginable."^[9]

Vulture's Matt Zoller Seitz praised the "terrific" cast and the story's sub-plots, writing "Eyre has cut the text to the bone, sometimes to its detriment, though the edits elevate the play's parallel, secondary story--the bastard Edmund (John McMillan) plotting against his father, the Earl of Gloucester (Jim Broadbent) and his half-brother Edgar (Andrew Scott)--in fascinating ways."^[10] Hanh Nguyen of IndieWire wrote that the adaptation "starts to break down near the last third with a choppiness that takes a toll on the logic of the piece" but commended the performances and stated "Amazon's King Lear is by no means a definitive adaptation of what is arguably the Bard's finest tragedy, but it is a thrilling and entertaining one."^[11]

Awards and nominations edit

• King Lear at BBC Online
• King Lear at IMDb  
• King Lear at Metacritic  
• King Lear at Rotten Tomatoes