Richard II

Let justice be done! Such is Henry Bolingbroke’s request to king Richard II after the murder of the Duke of Gloucester, their uncle. The future Henry IV accuses the Duke of Norfolk. What can the representative of God on earth do? Confess that he is the murderer? After an aborted duel, Richard II sentences both men to exile, seizes the land and money of several of the kingdom’s nobles, disinherits Bolingbroke, and declares war on the Irish. The throne of England sits empty, and popular Bolingbroke returns from exile to claim it, more and more rallying to his cause. Richard II is a tragedy of the word and of the exercise of power which, to the sound and fury of other plays, prefers the alliance of prediction and suspense. Haunted by Shakespeare’s great epics, Christophe Rauck directs this masterpiece heralding all the others. An impressive gallery of characters, a constellation surrounding a soon-to-fall king, all hiding a more central axis: the people.

Using Antiquity as a source and his contemporaries as inspiration, William Shakespeare brought dramatic language to such intensity that his tragedies and comedies take shape through it. No author has, since the 17th century, met with such universal acclaim. Since the creation of the Festival d’Avignon, no playwright has been performed more than Shakespeare.

Referred to as “histories,” Shakespeare’s history plays explore the history of England through the fear of civil wars. The chronology of their writing is hard to determine. Shakespeare first rose to fame thanks to the three plays written about Henry VI’s reign, overshadowing his earlier Richard II. Bringing together myth, epic, and tragedy, the English poet stages a confrontation between the legitimate king (Richard II) and its “legitimised usurper” (Henry IV) in a vast historical cycle written between the end of the 16th and the beginning of the 17th century.

With Louis Albertosi, Thierry Bosc, Éric Challier, Murielle Colvez, Cécile Garcia Fogel, Pierre-Thomas Jourdan, Guillaume Lévêque, Micha Lescot, Emmanuel Noblet, Pierre-Henri Puente, Adrien Rouyard

Direction Christophe Rauck
Text William Shakespeare
Translation Jean-Michel Déprats
Dramaturgy Lucas Samain
Music Sylvain Jacques
Set design Alain Lagarde
Lights Olivier Oudiou
Video Étienne Guiol
Costumes Coralie Sanvoisin
Masks Atelier 69
Make-up and hairstyles Cécile Kretschmar

Production Théâtre Nanterre-Amandiers
Co-production Festival d’Avignon 
With the support of the insertion program of the École du Nord, supported by the Région Hauts-de-France and the Ministère de la Culture, and in the framework of the 76th edition of the Festival d'Avignon : Spedidam