The Mad Gay King
05 October 2024
King’s Head Theatre
3.0 out of 5.0 stars
The Mad Gay King, staged at the King’s Head Theatre, follows the decadent life of King Ludwig II of Bavaria, the Fairytale King. His life was a fascinating one, an introverted and highly creative young gay man, taking the throne at the age of 18, throwing all his passions and finances into the arts, building lavish castles that astound visitors to this day, supporting Richard Wagner, and avoiding public functions and governing responsibilities. Ludwig’s life is filled with material to construct a play around, yet this work only tangentially touches a few main points, rushing through the regent’s life without any depth, omitting many important historical moments in favour of focussing on the king’s relationship with his horse master Richard Hornig.
While it’s extremely well acted by Elijah Ferreira as a lively and passionate Ludwig and David Buttle as grounded Richard Hornig, the characters seem overly stylized, almost caricatured, with little background to work with. The short running time of 70 minutes prohibits deeper exploration of both characters and story. There is so much in Ludwig’s life that would add to this story, but there simply isn’t enough time to delve into the depths and nuances.
The staging itself is quite stark, with a completely empty stage only adorned with four large light poles, lit up 6 foot shafts of bright LED lights that the actors keep moving around the stage. These lights are at times so bright, especially when directed at the audience, that the action on stage is difficult to look at, LEDs burning residual lines into the audience’s retinas. It’s stark and glaring, but does not provide benefits to the atmosphere or plot. Especially for a character like the Fairytale King, a more creative stage design would surely be called for.
Overall, this show has potential, but it needs work. And a lot more time to explore the full story, more depth to explore Ludwig’s life and his relationship with Hornig and Wagner in more emotional detail, and perhaps some work on the pronunciation of the German words used within the show. Still, it is a great start to tackle such a complex life story for the stage.
