By LINDA INOKI, Japan Times, October 5 1999

Before its world premiere in Saitama, Director Yukio Ninagawa promised "King Lear" as it's never been see before. He has been true to his word. On a black-and-white stage of monumental simplicity, "King Lear" has the impact of blood dashed on snow.

Previous productions such as "Macbeth" and "A Midsummer Night's Dream" have been internationally acclaimed, but this is his first co-production with the Royal Shakesreare Company, and his first time directing British cast. After Saitama, the play will open the RSC London season before transferring to the home of Shakespeare, Stratford on Avon.

This is part of an ambitious project by Saitama Arts Theater to stage the complete cycle of Shakespeare's 37 plays, all directed by Ninagawa. According to co-producer Thelma Holt, a leading impresario, "Ninagawa has an exceptional feeling for Shakespeare." He draws, however, on Japan's rich theatrical tradition to realize his aims.

Like a wizard, Ninagawa weaves a magical spell with strands of kabuki, memories of noh and fragments of our universal fears and dreams. The result is extraordinary:a seamless web of illusion.

The stately symmetry of the opening scene, where Lear casts aside his crown and sets the tragedy on course, is in dramatic contrast to the next, where Edmund crouches like a malevolent spider in a corner of the set. The great shadoes of the doors, carved with the gnarled pine tree of the noh theater, swing open or slide back to reveal the next wave of action. Music, mainly flutes and drums, is sparse yet used to great effect, enhanc- ing the emotions. For example, when Gloucester decides to defy orders and help the abandoned King, an eerie shamisen raises tension, and we sense the tide of evil as it gathers strength.

How does this very British cast blend with the exotic East? On the whole, very well. Sir Nigel Hawthorne, in the title role, is a distinguished actor and well known for his energetic, award-winning performance in "The Madness of King George III". At age 70, he brings power, subtly and intelligence to the human hurricane that is Lear. The scenes with Poor Tom are excellent, and when he surveys the mud-smeared wretch and says, "What, have his daughters brought him to this pass?" his comic skills raise a welcome laugh.

As he journeys beyond despair, he grows in humanity: When he pities the blind Gloucester, when he kneels before Cordelia, "a foolish, fond old man", and at the tragic end,when his grief veers between rage and calm, Hawthorne achieves the most difficult and important aspect of "King Lear", more than portraying a character, he reveals Shakespeare's arthetypal truth. Of the two ungrateful daughters, Sian Thomas' Goneril is a passionate portrait of evil, but Anna Chancellor's Regan seems to lack depth and development. Robin Weaver plays a stubborn and unsentimental Cordelia, which makes the reconciliation with Lear more moving."Mine enemy's dog should have stood that night against my life!" has the clarity of tears.

The sole Japanese actor, Hiroyuki Sanada, has the difficult role of the Fool. Physically, he is a great acrobat, but verbally he has to grapple with Elizabethan riddles. Yet this spirited, vulnerable Fool is excellent, and his warmth and grace are a wonderful contrast to the cold-hearted daughters. In Western theater actors rarely lose themselves and go beyond characterization into dramatic poetry. And although this is second nature to a noh- actor, he uses highly stylized means to achieve the transformation. However, this cast is from the realistic, expressive tradition of the West, and Ninagawa packs their energy and talent into the tightest space. During rehearsals he admitted that uniting opposite extrames was a struggle, "I want animalistic acting in a stylized set. That's why I'm fighting every day!" said Ninagawa.

In this production, he seems to have won.With nonessentials stripped away, and actors worked up to a tremendous pitch of concentration, the poetry of Shakespeare goes straight to the heart. There are many rich moments of theater:the spiritual "rebirth" of the king in a chariot of shimmering silk, the exultation of evil as Edmund rushes from the battle and revengeful Edgar, rising before a blood-red moon, as inexorable as fate. It recalls the lines from Mathew Arnord's poem on a Godless world: "And we are here as on a darkling plain, swept with confused alarms of struggle and fight, where ignarant armies clash by night."

From the moment the hounds of chaos are unleashed in Act1, the play gathers force, sweeping us along with. This total fusion of the senses is a hallmark of great theater: With the simplest of means we see a universal truth. When Lear dies of grief, a silent wave of shock and pity rolls across the actors and away from the stage. As the scene drops into haunting darkness it is almost pity to break the spell with applause.