Richard Burton:For God's sake, let us sit upon the ground And tell sad stories of the death of kings;

Act 3 Scene 2  - Richard Burton reading

Let's talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs;
Make dust our paper and with rainy eyes
Write sorrow on the bosom of the earth,
Let's choose executors and talk of wills:
And yet not so, for what can we bequeath
Save our deposed bodies to the ground?
Our lands, our lives and all are Bolingbroke's,
And nothing can we call our own but death
And that small model of the barren earth
Which serves as paste and cover to our bones.
For God's sake, let us sit upon the ground
And tell sad stories of the death of kings;
How some have been deposed; some slain in war,
Some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed;
Some poison'd by their wives: some sleeping kill'd;
All murder'd: for within the hollow crown
That rounds the mortal temples of a king
Keeps Death his court and there the antic sits,
Scoffing his state and grinning at his pomp,
Allowing him a breath, a little scene,
To monarchize, be fear'd and kill with looks,
Infusing him with self and vain conceit,
As if this flesh which walls about our life,
Were brass impregnable, and humour'd thus
Comes at the last and with a little pin
Bores through his castle wall, and farewell king!
Cover your heads and mock not flesh and blood
With solemn reverence: throw away respect,
Tradition, form and ceremonious duty,
For you have but mistook me all this while:
I live with bread like you, feel want,
Taste grief, need friends: subjected thus,
How can you say to me, I am a king?

Richard II - TV and Non RSC Theatre Productions

There have been many famous TV and non RSC theatre adaptations of Richard II as well with many famous actors in the lead.

On US TV, NBC Hallmark Hall of Fame presented Richard II with Maurice Evans in the lead - US audiences probably know him better as Maurice, Samantha's father on Bewitched and his portrayal of Dr. Zaius in Planet of the Apes. But he made his Broadway debut in Romeo and Juliet and he became famous for his Richard II on Broadway in 1937.

Ian McKellan starred in the 1970 BBC production  and then Derek Jacobi in 1978, again on the BBC with John Gielgud appearing as John of Gaunt.  Gielgud made the role of Richard his own back in 1929 at the Old Vic and reprised it again in 1937 and 1953.  This final performance was considered the definitive performance of the role.

2005 saw Richard II in a modern dress production at The Old Vic which starred Kevin Spacey as Richard.

Former RSC director Deborah Warner, who directed David in The Last September directed a TV movie of Richard II in a controversial production with Fiona Shaw as the lead, in drag.  They had originally staged the play at The National in 1995.

In 2003 Mark Rylance appeared in an all male cast at The Globe as Richard which saw one performance televised on BBC Four as a live & interactive broadcast which included interviews, commentary and backstage tours.

In 2012, as part of BBC Two's Shakespeare Unlocked season for the cultural Olympiad they screen The Hollow Crown, a mini-series of four of the history plays, Richard II, Henry IV parts 1 & 2 and Henry V.  Once again we got to see Mark Rylance as Richard.

To date there has never been a theatrical version of Richard II!

RSC history of Performing Richard II

The Royal Shakespeare Company wasn't actual granted their royal charter until 1925, 50 years after they were founded in 1875 when Shakespeare Memorial Theatre Ltd. company incorporated.

Richard the II was first performed at the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre in 1896 and then again in 1899 and 1901. Then the play was staged every year between 1904 and 1915 except for 1912.

The Memorial Theatre saw the perfomance 14 more times between 1920 and 1951.

The first performance of Richard II at the new Royal Shakespeare Theatre was in 1964.  The RSC toured with Richard II in 1971 and even took the play to Brooklyn Academy of Music Opera House, New York  in 1974.  Royal Shakespeare Theatre has been host to the play another 5 times between 1973 and 1990.

Not to be left out the other theatres at the RSC have also hosted the play - The Other Place in 2000 and The Courtyard in 2006 and 2007.

RSC productions of RIchard II have also graced The Barbican in London in 1987 and 1991 and The Pit in London in 2000.

The last time the RSC staged the play was in 2008 at The Roundhouse in London with Jonathan Slinger as Richard, reprising his 2007 Stratford performance.

Other famous Richard's at the RSC have included Michael Redgrave, David Warner, Jeremy Irons, and Samuel West.

Plot Summary

Richard II, written around 1595, is the first play in Shakespeare's second "history tetralogy," a series of four plays that chronicles the rise of the house of Lancaster to the British throne. (Its sequel plays are Henry IV, Parts 1 & 2, and Henry V.) Richard II, set around the year 1398, traces the fall from power of the last king of the house of Plantagenet, Richard II, and his replacement by the first Lancaster king, Henry IV (Henry Bolingbroke). Richard II, who ascended to the throne as a young man, is a regal and stately figure, but he is wasteful in his spending habits, unwise in his choice of counselors, and detached from his country and its common people. He spends too much of his time pursuing the latest Italian fashions, spending money on his close friends, and raising taxes to fund his pet wars in Ireland and elsewhere. When he begins to "rent out" parcels of English land to certain wealthy noblemen in order to raise funds for one of his wars, and seizes the lands and money of a recently deceased and much respected uncle to help fill his coffers, both the commoners and the king's noblemen decide that Richard has gone too far." - sparknotes.com