The Tragedy of King Richard the Third
The murderers arrive at the Tower with a warrant and, while they ponder how to carry out the deed, Clarence wakes and pleads for his life, telling them to go to Richard, who will reward them better for having kept him alive.
Assisted by his cousin Buckingham, Richard mounts a campaign to present himself as the true heir to the throne, pretending to be a modest and devout man with no pretensions to greatness.
Both sides arrive for a final battle at Bosworth Field, prior to which Richard, asleep, is visited by the ghosts of his victims, each telling him to "Despair and die".
Richard III is believed to be one of Shakespeare's earlier plays, preceded only by the three parts of Henry VI and perhaps Titus Andronicus and a handful of comedies.
[6]: p.50 Unlike his previous tragedy Titus Andronicus, the play avoids graphic demonstrations of physical violence; only Richard and Clarence are shown being stabbed on-stage, while the rest (the two princes, Hastings, Brackenbury, Grey, Vaughan, Rivers, Anne, Buckingham, and King Edward) all meet their ends off-stage.
Buckingham: "No, so God help me, they spake not a word ...") Puns, a Shakespearean staple, are especially well represented in the scene where Richard tries to persuade Queen Elizabeth to woo her daughter on his behalf.
[10]: p.62 Scholar Victor Kiernan writes that this interpretation is a perfect fit with the English social perspective of Shakespeare's day: "An extension is in progress of a privileged class's assurance of preferential treatment in the next world as in this, to a favoured nation's conviction of having God on its side, of Englishmen being ... the new Chosen People".
Kiernan also presents this side of the coin, noting that Richard "boasts to us of his finesse in dissembling and deception with bits of Scripture to cloak his 'naked villainy' (I.iii.334–348) ... Machiavelli, as Shakespeare may want us to realise, is not a safe guide to practical politics".
[11]: p.111–112 Kiernan suggests that Richard is merely acting as if God is determining his every step in a sort of Machiavellian manipulation of religion as an attempt to circumvent the moral conscience of those around him.
She makes the argument that the difference in speech "reinforces the thematic division between the women's identification with the social group and Richard's individualism".
[14]: p.37 Scholar Michael E. Mooney describes Richard as occupying a "figural position"; he is able to move in and out of it by talking with the audience on one level, and interacting with other characters on another.
As Richard gets closer to seizing the crown, he encloses himself within the world of the play; no longer embodying his facile movement in and out of the dramatic action, he is now stuck firmly within it.
[15] In addition, the character of Richmond enters into the play in Act V to overthrow Richard and save the state from his tyranny, effectively being the instantaneous new protagonist.
Basil Rathbone played Richard III in the 1939 Universal horror film Tower of London, which was directed by Rowland V. Lee.
Sellers, who had aspirations to do the role straight, appeared in a 1965 TV special on the Beatles' music by reciting "A Hard Day's Night" in the style of Olivier's Richard III.
The first episode of the BBC television comedy Blackadder in part parodies the Olivier film, visually (as in the crown motif), Peter Cook's performance as a benevolent Richard, and by mangling Shakespearean text ("Now is the summer of our sweet content made o'ercast winter by these Tudor clouds ...") Richard Loncraine's 1995 film, starring Ian McKellen, is set in a fictional fascist England in the 1930s, and based on an earlier highly successful stage production.
Also in 1996, a pristine print of Richard III (1912), starring Frederick Warde in the title role, was discovered by a private collector and donated to the American Film Institute.
In the out-take interviews of the 1983 Brian De Palma classic Scarface, writer Oliver Stone indicated that his pre-script influences had included William Shakespeare's Richard III.
[19] In 2017, Italian director Roberta Torre realized a musical drama film, inspired by Shakespeare's play, named Bloody Richard.
BBC Two aired a new adaptation of Richard III in 2016 as part of The Hollow Crown series, with Benedict Cumberbatch playing the king.
Executive producer Pippa Harris commented, "By filming the Henry VI plays as well as Richard III, we will allow viewers to fully appreciate how such a monstrous tyrant could find his way to power, bringing even more weight and depth to this iconic character.
Shakespeare critic Keith Jones believes that the film in general sets up its main character as a kind of antithesis to Richard III.
[23] In the Red Dwarf episode "Marooned", Rimmer objects to Lister's burning of the Complete Works of Shakespeare in an attempt to maintain enough heat to keep him alive.
In the 1949 Looney Tunes cartoon A Ham in a Role, the dog actor says Catesby and Richard III's lines, "Rescue, fair lord, or else the day is lost!
[28] In V for Vendetta when V confronts Father Lilliman, he quotes the line "And thus I clothe my naked villany in old odd ends stol'n forth of holy writ, and seem a saint when most I play the devil."
[citation needed] The manga Requiem of the Rose King by Aya Kanno, which began in 2013, is a loose adaptation of the first Shakespearean historical tetralogy.
Some interpreted Richard's Act IV speech as an omen favourable to the South[citation needed]: a bard of Ireland told me once I should not live long after I saw Richmond.
Within a fortnight of the president's visit to the defeated city, he was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth, a Shakespearean actor known for playing both Richard and Richmond.
[37] Henry VI's widow, Queen Margaret, was not at court in the period covered by this play; she became Edward IV's prisoner and returned to France in 1475.
[48] The only contemporary reference to Richard having any deformities was the observation that his right shoulder was slightly higher than his left, which is now known to have been caused by his scoliosis of the spine.
