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William Shakespeare’s King Lear: Film production by Richard Eyre or Michael Elliott? King Lear today rivals Hamlet as the most frequently performed William Shakespeare play. King Lear is a timeless tale of human greed, lust for power and lost loyalties. Directors’ Richard Eyre and Michael Elliott have produced two distinctively different film adaptations of Shakespeare’s play King Lear. Richard Eyre's King Lear production aired on television in 1998 and earned Ian Holm the 1997 Olivier Award of the Society of London Theatre. Eyre’s production is an adventure into minimalism. He uses film construction techniques to create a central theme drawn from the ideals presented by Shakespeare in the original play. Its evident through the use of setting, the framing of certain shots and costuming that Eyre is focusing on a nihilistic and slightly feminist reading of King Lear. Costuming as an important element of characterisation. Through costuming, Eyre explores the idea that there is no purpose in good or evil by dressing the characters Regan in white, usually representing goodness, Gonerill in black, predominately used to portray evil, and Cordelia in brown, a simple colour that doesn’t have much personality, through