Devon-born director Richard Eyre, 75, has worked across film, theatre, TV and opera, winning five Olivier awards and a Bafta. He was artistic director of the National Theatre from 1987 until 1997 and his films include Iris and Notes on a Scandal. He has adapted and directed the BBC’s new, feature-length version of King Lear.
You’re working in New York at the moment. How’s it going?
Very well. Our production of Long Day’s Journey Into Night, which was playing in the West End, has opened at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. I would even say it’s been received with rapture [laughs].
It’s a bruising play to watch. Is it like that to direct, too?
In a way. There’s just so much of it and it’s all about family, so in those respects it’s similar to King Lear. And it does mean dredging up one’s own experience of family, which can be quite bittersweet. All families are bittersweet, but some are more bitter than sweet.
How did the TV version of King Lear come about?
Myself and Anthony Hopkins hatched the idea while making The Dresser. “Sir” [Hopkins’s ageing classical actor] is performing Lear, so we talked a lot about the play and Tony was very keen to make a film of it. When we raised the money from the BBC and Amazon, the brief was to make it under two hours. It’s a fantastically fierce discipline to reduce what’s at least a three-hour play. Yet once I sat down and started, it was exhilarating. I was distilling the essence of the play, so could be justifiably ruthless. It’s the ultimate family drama: a monstrous, tragic tale of a family destroying itself.
The ending is savage…
It’s a domestic holocaust. That’s the precise resonance I wanted when it ends with a pile of corpses on a trolley.
Why did you set it in a 21st-century military dictatorship?
The original play takes place in a pre-Christian era, but setting it in the eighth-century BC would mean they’d all have beards and it would end up looking like Planet of the Apes. I couldn’t face that and it would be alienating on TV. Instead, I went for a fictitious present. My way of bridging the gap between Shakespeare’s language and the modern day was to set scenes in old buildings. A military dictator in Britain wouldn’t occupy Buckingham Palace, he’d occupy that symbol of military strength for generations, the Tower of London, which happens to sit in a sea of contemporary skyscrapers. It developed from there. By setting the storm scene in a refugee camp and the mad scene in a shopping centre, I hope there are extra contemporary resonances.
An erratic leader with his family around him. Did you have the Trumps in mind?
I didn’t, actually. There’s something so clownish about Trump.I was thinking more of Stalin and other violent autocrats. It’s a story of two fathers, Lear and Gloucester, who both love their children in the most brutal fashion. All fathers tend to be autocrats in their own home. Here, the family story is amplified because Lear is also the father of the state.
You directed the National’s landmark 1997 production of King Lear, starring Ian Holm. What was it like returning to the play after 20 years?
My sister came to see it in ’97 and was indignant. She said: “You’ve put our father on the stage.” She was right, but it was completely unintentional. Ever since, I’ve had very personal feelings about it. The intervening years have allowed me to distance myself, so I’m not clouded by dreams of my father.
Is Anthony Hopkins even more like your father?
Tony’s portrayal is very much based on his own father, actually. It’s a remarkable performance.
John Macmillan plays Edmund. Were you keen to cast a black actor in that role?
Graphically, it made sense because it clarifies that they’re of different parentage. It’s shocking the way Gloucester treats his illegitimate son and casting a black actor amplifies that. You feel that rejection in the pit of your stomach. It’s also completely plausible that he’s resentful, living in a world where he’s already regarded as inferior. Mainly, though, [it’s because] John is the most brilliant actor.
It’s a high-calibre cast: Emma Thompson, Emily Watson, Christopher Eccleston, Andrew Scott, Tobias Menzies…
Not forgetting the butler from Downton Abbey [Jim Carter]! I got all the actors I wanted, which is luck of a rare kind. Many followed in the wake of Tony Hopkins. Chris Eccleston, who plays Oswald, sent me a letter, saying: “Can I be in it? I’ve wanted to work with Anthony Hopkins all my life.”
What are the challenges of making Shakespeare for TV?
First of all, there’s cutting the text. There’s making it feel as natural as possible, making it accessible and comprehensible, while honouring the rhythms of blank verse. With House of Cards-style asides to camera, you can achieve intimacy, which is hard to do in theatre. I’ve played with the order of scenes and occasionally moved dialogue, so I’ve taken some liberties but haven’t rewritten any lines.
Your latest film is The Children Act, adapted from Ian McEwan’s novel, out in August. Does cinema need more adult dramas?
I hope so. It’s definitely a grownup film, which does feel anomalous. A friend of mine saw it and said: “I see you’ve made a French film.” I thought: “Oh right. Well, good.” I’m a huge fan of French cinema, so took it as a backhanded compliment.
What theatre have you enjoyed lately?
I liked [Nina Raine’s] Consent a lot. Nick Hytner’s Julius Caesar was extremely enjoyable. And obviously Hamilton is absolutely terrific and redefines the musical.
What are your fondest memories from running the National for a decade?
So many. I loved putting on Angels in America the first time around… that was an astonishing play. Richard III with Ian McKellen was a high.
You’ve talked publicly about suffering with depression…
It’s now permissible for people to admit their vulnerabilities publicly – without grandstanding or self-pitying – and expect to be treated sympathetically. That’s real progress. Prince Harry has helped – his Heads Together initiative is really valuable.
What’s your next project?
I’m rehearsing another play: Elizabeth Strout’s beautiful novel My Name Is Lucy Barton, adapted into a monologue, with Laura Linney. That opens next month in London. Then we take Long Day’s Journey to Los Angeles. I’ve done an adaptation of Strindberg’s Dance of Death that I’m hoping to do with Lesley Manville and Ralph Fiennes. Oddly enough, I’ve also started writing poetry in the past two years and, without planning to, I’ve written what’s essentially an autobiography in verse [published this autumn]. I feel exposed and nervous about that. Maybe it’s a folly, but we’ll see.
Not taking it easy, are you?
[Laughs] No. Why would I? I’m only 75.
King Lear is on BBC2 at 9.30pm on Monday 28 May
This article was amended on 21 May 2018 to correct the cast list of King Lear: Emma Thompson (not Emma Watson) is one of the stars
