Danai Gurira on Starring in Robert O’Hara’s ‘Richard III’: ‘It Should Be a Historical Play, But It’s Actually a Political Thriller’
variety.comMichael Appler Robert O’Hara, the Tony Award-nominated director and acclaimed playwright, sat beneath a tree near the side of the Delacorte Theater in Central Park.
On the opening night of “Richard III,” a searing adaptation of Shakespeare’s tragedy mounted by O’Hara and The Public Theater in Central Park this summer, the director shied away from the photographers and the spotlight.Before taking his seat in the back of the house, watching restlessly as directors do on opening nights, he sat beneath a tree in the quiet and talked about Richard.“We all look more like the devil than we think we do,” O’Hara told Variety, breathing in to describe his production. “In order to make a villain less like who we are, Shakespeare gave Richard his deformity.
There’s been a history of people and productions whose instinct it is to physicalize Richard’s villainy, rather than internalize it.
But that’s where we’re going.” O’Hara’s “Richard III“ stars Danai Gurira, known for her work in “Black Panther,” as the infamously deformed and murderous despot.
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