The profound intertextuality between William Shakespeare’s 1597 historical tragedy King Richard III (KRIII) and Al Pacino’s 1996 docudrama Looking for Richard (LFR) is portrayed to a considerable degree through the organic synthesis and resynthesis of the representation of values. The composers’ selection of textual devices and their exhibitions of societal influence illuminates an abundance of resonant and dissonant relationships between both texts. Pacino’s goal while ‘looking for’ his post modern audience’s perceptions of Shakespeare is to “reach out to a modern audience,” conveying that textual conversations reveal composers to be perpetually responding to the values of their time. We see this through the inclusion of two key idealistic concerns the nature of deceptive power and the manipulation of textual form.
During my critical study of both KRIII and LFR, the complex interplay between the textual mediums was nothing short of enthralling–in particular, the resonating perspective of immorality and deceit that I have rarely encountered in my secular (and even privileged) context in a first world country.
The portrayal of deceit in both KRIII and LFR foremost demonstrates the way that evolving social paradigms are portrayed through the manipulation of textual form. Throughout KRIII, the reoccurring motif of the interplay between light and dark imagery augments the intertextual tone of deception that is subtly established in the binary opposition of Richard’s soliloquy “Now is the winter of our discontent / Made glorious summer by this son of York”. Shakespeare enhances this delicate tension through foreshadowing Richard as “determined to prove a villain” and his metaphor “to see my shadow in the sun,” exemplifying his potential to be virulently manipulative. This notion is clinically enhanced with Margaret’s hyperbole that he “turns the sun to shade,” alluding to the description of natural order mandated by Sir Philip Sidney’s The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia and circumventing the religious tension among Shakespeare’s audience during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I. Through ingenious use of the feminine pronoun, “Peace may live again, that she may long live, God say amen,” Shakespeare bows to the overarching authority of Elizabeth and seals his play and his audience’s reception with a pivotal endorsement of the Tudor myth. The play and Shakespeare’s meticulous control over such a form exemplifies the effect of the representation of deceptive power for both contextual responders and our own comparative study. Thus, through the aforementioned acts and the representation of deceit, Shakespeare establishes the notion that composers are perpetually responding to the values of their time, providing a platform onto which Pacino can align his artistic and textual intentions.
The notion of deceptive power is prolifically translated by Pacino through a microcosm of resynthesis, as Pacino effectively manipulates form to implicitly paint Richard as the successful Machiavellian that American audiences have too often voted for. While utilising the medium of a post modern “docu drama type thing,” Pacino details that “Richard has let his pursuit of power totally corrupt him” and is “alienated from his body and self”. The desolate adjective and the personification of his pursuit of power retains the influences of Shakespeare’s original synthesis, establishing Richard’s disconnection from his spirit and attaining a superficial satisfaction of the Elizabethan providence. This institution of Richard is enhanced as Pacino cleverly couples a muted shot of Spacey above adoring crowds with that of Vanessa Redgrave’s expert opinion that “those in power have total contempt for everything they promise,” prompting his audience to reconsider the nature of deceit and immorality within their own political discourse. Hence, through the lens of Pacino’s reimaginings, we see that composers can design form to respond to the values of their time while they shape meaning to explore transcendent idealistic concerns. Accordingly, the consideration of acts of invention and reinvention are pivotal when critically evaluating the connection between KRIII and LFR.
The insatiable desire for power is a personality trait that is at the heart of Richard’s deceptive persona and, whether attained by a king such as Richard or a contemporary politician, has remained a pertinent topic of concern across contexts from the providential Elizabethan to the secular, post modern America. Richard initially embodies the amorality of Machiavelli’s The Prince as he is fashioned by Shakespeare in the tradition of Medieval morality plays. He is explicitly characterised as such through allusion to a sixteenth century Vice archetype “Thus, like the formal vice, Iniquity / I moralise two meanings in one word.” The emphatic simile establishes his true intentions, whilst a dramatic aside enables the ‘breaking’ of the fourth wall to ensnare the Elizabethan audience in Richard’s iniquitous subterfuge. The final act of Shakespeare’s KRIII in which Richmond describes Richard as “The wretched, bloody and usurping boar / That spoiled your summer fields and fruitful vines” further exposes Richard’s dishonour through the double entendre, referencing both to his royal badge as well as his shattered prosperity. The vivid imagery detailed by the “summer fields and fruitful vines” clouds the audience’s final perception of Richard, triggering a deluge of recollections of the light and dark motif. Finally, he proclaims that “There is no creature loves me, / And if I die no soul shall pity me”, utilising noun choice to exercise the concept that, through his pursuit of power, Richard knows he has lost his humanity and spirit.
Through acts of resynthesis, Pacino mirrors Shakespeare’s multifaceted summation of conscient power while allowing his audience to inspect the meaning of the parent text with greater depth. Fluid cross cutting is deployed by Pacino efficaciously as the transition from daylight rehearsal to a costumed performance of Richard’s dramatic soliloquy exhibits that duality is at his core. Accordingly, Pacino calls our attention to this resonance to deepen our understanding of Shakespeare’s deployment of textual devices. Continued “method acting type stuff” that “blurs the lines” between Richard and Pacino illustrates his growing power while consuming both identities, reflective of the postmodern plurality of truth. As a prominent textual device, allusion transcends to Pacino’s artistic realm as he resynthesises the notion of power. The meaning of his ambition to mould the representation of the original text is strikingly consolidated as he describes “a gathering of the Dons in this room,” alluding to the competitive yuppie culture of the 1980s that he experienced following his role in The Godfather. This Mafioso vibe is reflected in Pacino’s interpretation of Clarence’s death, where Richard is filmed in a sharp low angle shot complemented by dramatic use of chiaroscuro lighting to establish the dominance of his malevolent intentions. Pacino indulges in his own artistic synthesis through the addition of political scenes that Shakespeare’s play excluded such as the slaughter of the princes, accompanied by tyrannical non diegetic music and the use of a hand held camera filming the director. He explains that “Richard has attained this power now… and they [Richmond] are attacking him from all sides.” Pacino’s inventive representation of the corrupting nature of power as an evil challenge to divine authority has allowed communication of the evolving social values of late Elizabethan England. Therefore, through comparing the importance of context and form during the processes of reinvention of the representation of idealistic concerns, we may glean a greater awareness of the composer within each text. Ultimately, while studying KRIII and LFR in conjunction and evaluating the composers’ selection of textual devices and their exhibitions of societal influence, we gain a greater appreciation of the values instilled in the original text.
From a providential, Elizabethan England shifting into the self determinism of the Renaissance, to a secular, post modern America, Shakespeare’s King Richard III and Pacino’s Looking for Richard exhibit their intertextuality through their evaluative synthesis and resynthesis of the complex and plural nature of deceptive power within society. By responding critically with respect to each composer, our understanding of evolving social paradigms and the way they are portrayed through the manipulation of textual form are profoundly deepened.
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