The Madness of George III is as perfectly realized a play as you’re ever likely to see. In fact, it flirts with coming off a little too perfectly at times, and no wonder: Brit playwright Alan Bennett has had multiple opportunities to fiddle with his already masterful account of an English monarch’s mental breakdown since it first saw light in 1991. Bennett wrote the Oscar-nominated script for the 1994 movie version as well as an adaptation for the American stage. According to a program note, the Madness on display in Penny Metropulos’s sharp new production for Chicago Shakespeare Theatre combines elements from all three previous incarnations.
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The combination of Bennett’s extraordinary wit and 20 years of buffing yields a play in which pretty much everything you’re likely to think of has been anticipated and beautifully wrought. Did it occur to you that Shakespeare had his own mad old king, Lear? Bennett found that parallel early on, and made it the basis of a gorgeous scene. Do you hear an erudite echo of Richard II in King George’s oddly precise ravings? Bennett put it there. He also supplied a sly reference the French Revolution, some evergreen bits on taxes, and a cute little throwaway line connecting a royal page named Fortnum with the London luxury goods store Fortnum & Mason.
The king’s collapse threw the government into chaos. Bennett shows us the maneuverings that went on between the Tory prime minister, William Pitt the Younger, and a Whig faction anxious to install the Prince of Wales as regent. But the central drama here concerns George himself as he struggles to keep a grip on his family, sanity, health, authority, and sense of self.
Through 6/12: Wed-Sun, Chicago Shakespeare Theater, 800 E. Grand, 312-595-5600, chicagoshakes.com, $44-$75.
