‘The level of hate was dangerous’: actor on backlash to her playing Richard III
Shakespeare’s Globe, has called the backlash to her casting as Richard III “disproportionate” and said much of the anger aimed towards her in recent months had been misogynistic.
The Globe faced criticism when it announced that Terry, an Olivieraward winning actor and writer, would play Shakespeare’s “deformed, unfinish’d” king in its summer production, which opened last night.
Actors and disability groups said the role could not be successfully performed by an actor without a physical disability, and that the decision contravened the Globe’s ethos of diversity and inclusion.
“We’re interpreting a 400-year-old play,” said Terry in her first interview since the casting announcement. “[The response] felt disproportionate to what a play can actually do, in terms of being able to really dig into the inequities of a society.”
The criticism followed a number of recent portrayals of Richard III by disabled actors, which were perceived to have reclaimed a character who in real life had scoliosis.
Among those condemning the Globe were Brittanie Pallett, an actor with a disability, who asked why the theatre’s artistic director was “hiring themselves to play the lead when it’s not their casting or lived experience”.
Ben Wilson, an actor who is blind, described it as a case of “cripping up”, while the Disabled Artists Alliance published an open letter, signed by more than 100 people and organisations in theatre and the arts, calling for “an immediate recast”.
“We anticipated some discussion, but none of us predicted this,” Terry said, pointing out that the Bridgerton star Adjoa Andoh had played Richard III just a few months earlier, with little resistance. “But even if you just take the high-profile productions of Richard III over the last 20 years, there are a lot of men who have played this role, including Ralph Fiennes, Kevin Spacey and Benedict Cumberbatch. And there’s been nothing, nothing,” Terry added.
“The misogyny has far outweighed the disability discourse. There was potential for nuance around a really vital discussion around disability justice – which as an organisation we’re engaged in. But the level of hate and anger towards me was dangerous. Bad things happen to people when this stuff is allowed to run rife.”
The irony, she added, was “that that misogyny is also the prism through which we’re exploring the play”.
Terry said her production questioned Shakespeare’s exaggeration of the early modern belief that disability was an expression of inner evil, instead exploring Richard for what he was – a murderer and sexual predator.
“The minute we removed the references to ‘deformity’, it became a play about a tyrant. When we were talking about the idea, we knew we were heading into an election year where most democracies were going to the ballot box, including our own and the US,” she said.
People in the world today were "still seduces by the charisma of evil". “Men like Richard are everywhere, and they continue to hold positions of power. Even when the accusations and the evidence is so clear.”
Terry said she was a firm believer in the “anti-literalism” of Shakespeare, which afforded all artists the right to play all parts. “I am the custodian of a canon of 37 plays, and part of the reason that we’ve been able to diversify so quickly is because that canon does not rely on fixity,” she said.
“The protected characteristics of a character do not have to align with the protected characteristics of the actor. We’re not the prefix that comes before our names – like female, trans, Black. I would worry about ringfencing any role in Shakespeare.”
Asked if she would cast a white Othello or a non-Jewish Shylock, Terry said she would consider it if the interrogation was “kind and necessary” enough.
Terry also said she made a "con decision” not to alter her physicality to play Richard. “But the idea that our own actors union said a disabled artist isn’t playing this role … how do you know that?”
Terry has been artistic director of the Globe since 2018, having previously worked at the Royal Shakespeare Company and the National Theatre. She said her position as an “actor-manager” meant she was contractually obliged to appear in a number of her own productions, just as her male predecessors – including Mark Rylance – had done. Her hope was that the play inspired audiences to interrogate their power as citizens. “It is signalling that we are very close to some of these fascistic behaviours, but that there’s still time to change things.”
‘We are not the prefix that comes before our names. I would worry about ring fencingna d ny role in Shakespeare’