You Had Me At Peter Dinklage. I Thought.

Al Pacino’s almost mythical King Lear project draws closer to reality! We have a cast now for “Lear Rex”, the Pacino / Jessica Chastain project that, by my calendar, has been buzzed about for almost 15 years.

https://deadline.com/2024/08/star-cast-aligns-around-al-pacino-jessica-chastain-for-bernard-roses-lear-rex-lakeith-stanfield-ariana-debose-peter-dinklage-1236029062

Peter Dinklage (Game of Thrones) has attained a status in his career where you hear his name and you assume whatever he’s about to do has got to be good. So when I saw him attached to a King Lear I immediately started wondering what role we might see him in. He’s a presence, so no minor character. He’s also typically a good guy, though I’d love to see him play the villain. Edgar? He might make a great Cornwall. But alas it’s probably going to be …

Fool. He’s playing Fool.

Lear and his Fool

I guess it makes sense, and I’m sure he’ll kill it. I just think that at the end of the day Fool is minor to the action, and that’s not where we’re used to seeing Dinklage. A character who literally just disappears, with no ending? I guess we’ll have to wait to see what they do to the story. Other productions have given Fool a more pronounced ending.

Let’s see who else we’ve got?

Ariana DeBose (West Side Story) as Cordelia. I have no idea how I feel about this. There’ll (hopefully!) be no singing and dancing here. Can she carry such a lead role here? Does she have any Shakespeare experience?

Rachel Brosnahan (The Marvelous Mrs Maisel) as Regan is fine, but Jessica Chastain is playing Goneril. That feels a bit lopsided, no matter how much I enjoyed Brosnahan’s performance in Mrs. Maisel.

Stephen Dorff, who has been around so long that I can’t pin a particular credit on him, is listed as playing “Poor Tom.” What exactly does that mean? I have no idea. Edmund gets a specific credit, and Gloucester, but not Edgar? Is that just the way it’s written, or is that some indication about the story? A character of Poor Tom makes no sense without him being Edgar in disguise, unless he’s been reduced to just a random crazy person that Lear befriends, and they’re leaving out Edgar’s whole story.

A number of other names are listed in the linked article, though I admit that I do not recognize them enough to have an opinion (no offense to intended). Let me know in the comments if you’re excited about any particular casting!

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