By Kevin Nance
Contributing Writer | Photos

A succession is coming. The old patriarch is teetering, looking to preserve his territory and extend his legacy, but the future is uncertain. His heirs, variously unsuited to take over at the top, are a fractious bunch of backstabbers, ambitious, scheming, disingenuous, disloyal. His formidable, estranged wife, his lithe young mistress, both with their own agendas — don’t even get him started. He loves them all, in his way, as they love him in theirs, which is to say the knives are out. Let the fun begin!

No, this isn’t a hard-hitting HBO series like “Game of Thrones” or “House of the Dragon,” “House of Cards”or “Succession.” Nor is it the recent American presidential election and the just-concluded transfer of power from one regime to another. Nor is it the real-life inspiration for “Succession”: the legal drama currently unfolding between the aging business titan Rupert Murdoch and his adult children over control of his conservative media empire, including Fox News. 

It is in fact “The Lion in Winter,” James Goldman’s crackling and literate 1966 Broadway play about Henry II of England, the Plantagenet king struggling with his queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine, and their three scions over the royal succession in 1183. Henry supports his younger son John, dim and weak but theoretically loyal, to succeed him on the throne, while Eleanor backs Richard, later known as the Lionheart for his prowess on the battlefield but rumored to be homosexual. Their brother Geoffrey — who in real life was dead by the time of the play, set during a Christmas gathering at Henry’s castle at Chinon, Anjou, in what is now France — is angling for advantage by manipulating John and their guest, Philip II of France. Rounding out this nest of serpents is the young French princess Alais, Henry’s mistress, Phillip’s half-sister and Eleanor’s long-ago ward.

But in a new production by On the Verge at Lexington’s Luigart Studios, the play’s resonances with contemporary dynamics in the White House and elsewhere have rarely been clearer, intentionally so. Using modern dress, sets and decor to underline the script’s hot-off-the-press quality, director Ave Lawyer has approached “The Lion in Winter” as a fractured mirror of our own politically and culturally fraught times.

Ave Lawyer, Director of “The Lion in Winter”

“The play is set in a specific political moment with specific political circumstances,” Lawyer says in an interview. “What makes it immediate and contemporary and of this moment is that it’s a play of succession. It’s set in an inflection point in history, in which a certain order is about to change, and a new order is about to take over. You have an aging monarch, oligarch, ceo — whatever you want to call it — about to step aside and nominate a successor, and if you don’t see a reflection in contemporary politics, well….” She waves a dismissive hand. “And in this moment of shifting, where everything is on the table and up for grabs, what will people do? What will you become to become top dog? Who will you throw under the bus? How will you lie, cheat, scheme, stab your own family members in the back in order to grasp the prize?”

During rehearsals, Lawyer says, she would often look at the newspapers and feel as if the world of the play and the present moment in America were all but indistinguishable. In response to an article about Kimberly Guilfoyle, the ex-fiancée of Donald Trump Jr., being nominated as the U.S. ambassador to Greece, Lawyer smiles and says, “My sympathies are with Greece.”

Not that “The Lion in Winter” — best known for its 1968 film adaptation starring Peter O’Toole and Katharine Hepburn as Henry and Eleanor, with Hepburn winning an Academy Award for her performance — is uniquely redolent of the Trump/Biden/Murdoch era. “It would be redolent of any moment in which power shifts from one entity to the next,” Lawyer says. “Either you have your succession set, or you risk your ruling house losing power altogether. This idea of who comes next, and how you secure your legacy, is incredibly important, and also timeless. So yes, the play is a reflection of this moment and of many moments to come, because people are people.”

And families are families, whether at Chinon, the Oval Office, Mar-a-Lago or your own holiday table when daddy’s slipping, and the question is who’s going to take over when he’s gone? Lives are at stake, not to mention the family business and, by the way, the money. Then again, we share the same history, the same DNA. We hate each other’s guts at times, but we love each other too, which is so inconvenient.

“It’s not just pieces on the chessboard,” Lawyer says. “These are human beings, and all that lovely, messy human family stuff is right there along with the rest. Who loves who? Who feels neglected? Who feels I was daddy’s favorite, and now I’m being passed over? And then there’s love, especially between Henry and Eleanor, and that is what they have to work against: their love for each other and their need to achieve something larger in terms of legacy. Their personal feelings and their responsibilities on a larger scale are always in conflict. That’s what absolutely makes this play so juicy.”

Kevin Hardesty as Henry, Missy Johnson as Eleanor

Veteran Lexington actor Kevin Hardesty, who plays Henry, relishes this collision of public ambition and family feeling (including, at times, the lack thereof, especially from his rebellious sons). “He takes some responsibility for that, saying he raised them to be that way, but what he’s doing is trying to ensure this lineage,” Hardesty says. “The relationship with Eleanor is interesting. He had to imprison her for ten years, but there’s so much history between them. I think there was a true, sexual, romantic connection with them for so long, and still there are sparks of it here and there.”

That spark of passion flares hot and cold in one of the play’s signature scenes, in which the aging Eleanor (played by Missy Johnston) demands to watch Henry kiss young Alais (Shelby Vogelpohl). In the film version, Hepburn may have sealed her Oscar win with her tortured reaction, shown in closeup, to the kiss.   

“Of course we don’t get closeups in a play, but I’m working that moment,” Johnston says during a break from rehearsal. “I think she does that to steel herself against what’s coming. She’s got to toughen herself to go to war, because it is a war. And yet it costs her a lot.”

The CEO and members of his board: Kevin Hardesty as Henry, Shelby Vogelpohl as Alais and Missy Johnston as Eleanor of Aquitaine..

In one sense, “The Lion in Winter” is a bit of a departure for On the Verge, best known for its site-specific productions of classic and modern plays in historic homes and other venues in Central Kentucky such as the Bodley-Bullock House (“The Little Foxes”), Hopemont (“Uncle Vanya”), Ward Hall (“The Cherry Orchard”), Milward Funeral Home (“Three Viewings”) and the Brand-Barrow House (“A Doll’s House”). Luigart Studios, on the other hand, is a former warehouse that in recent years has been undergoing a gradual transformation into funky, quirky event space, art gallery and artist studio complex. Certainly, there’s nothing about Luigart that suggests a medieval castle. 

Then again, this production’s non-period approach renders that a moot point. “James Goldman in an interview said that this is a work of the imagination,” Lawyer points out. “It’s based on historical characters, but the truth lies underneath. By saying that, he essentially opens the door to a director being able to imagine an approach that is not one hundred percent literal. So, we’re not looking at it from a broadswords-and-doublets point of view.” 

Tanner Gray as John, Shayne Brakefield as Richard, Tim Hull as Geoffrey 

Instead, some of the set decorations are borrowed from Luigart’s eclectic holdings of mid-century modern furniture and decor as well as what Luigart co-owner Mike Satterly calls his “30-year collection of doors,” which helps define the production’s various performance spaces. 

Like On the Verge’s previous productions, “The Lion in Winter” asks its audience members to move from one area of the venue to another as the action shifts from room to room. 

“Luigart is definitely influencing the look of the show,” says Tom Willis, the production’s technical director and lighting designer. “There’s a wealth of material and creativity at Luigart. The space here is flexible enough to absorb all that.” 

“The Lion in Winter” by On the Verge runs at 7 p.m. Jan. 23-25, Jan. 30-31 and Feb. 1; and 2 p.m. Jan. 26 at Luigart Studios, 110 Luigart Court. Ticket information at OnTheVerge.org.