Orson Welles and Natasha Parry
October 18, 1953: The CBS TV anthology series Omnibus airs a version of William Shakespeare's 1606 play King Lear. Orson Welles directed, and starred. It is heavily abridged, to fit in the broadcast's 90-minute limit, making room for commercials, so it comes in at 73 minutes.
Already having starred in Citizen Kane, in which he played a man whose empire falls apart as he ages, Welles, though just 38 years old, was ideal to play the elderly, senile Lear. The fact that his massive weight gain had begun may have helped.
In the play, Lear decides to divide his kingdom among his 3 daughters: In descending order of age, they are Goneril, Duchess of Albany (played here by Beatrice Straight); Regan, Duchess of Cornwall (Margaret Phillips); and Cordelia (Natasha Parry), who later marries the King of France (a nation which did not exist in Lear's alleged time, but, as he often did, Shakespeare took some dramatic license).
Goneril and Regan make flattering speeches, but Cordelia, who had previously been his favorite daughter, says she loves him according to her duty. Outraged, Lear disowns Cordelia, dividing her inheritance between her two sisters. Lear sets conditions: He retains the title of King, he will reside with Goneril and Regan, and he keeps a retinue of a hundred knights. The Duke of Kent chastises Lear for abdicating and for disowning Cordelia, so Lear banishes him. Lear offers Cordelia without a dowry to her suitors. France accepts, admiring her honesty.
One thing leads to another, and Lear goes mad, and loses control of his kingdom. But he reconciles with Cordelia. Goneril poisons Regan, thinking it will gain her full control of the kingdom. But her plan falls apart, and she commits suicide. The remaining forces of Goneril and Regan hang Cordelia, and leave her body for Lear to find. He dies of grief, and the play leaves the kingdom's fate unresolved.
Supposedly, Lear was a real king, who ruled over part of Britain in the 8th Century BC. But, as with King Arthur centuries later, there seems to be no evidence of his existence except for stories written centuries later.
Pretty much every actor who specializes in Shakespeare's works has played Lear at least once. Paul Scofield played him in a 1971 film, Michael Holden played him in BBC productions in 1975 and 1982, Laurence Olivier for Granada Television in 1983, Ian Holm for the BBC in 1998, and Anthony Hopkins for BBC Two in 2018. The ending of The Godfather Part III, where Mary (Sofia Coppola) dies in the arms of an aging, ailing, screaming Michael Corleone (Al Pacino), has been compared to Cordelia's death.
Omnibus was funded by the Ford Foundation, and filmed at CBS Studio 58, at 851 9th Avenue at 55th Street in Midtown Manhattan. It ran from 1952 to 1961. After canceling it, CBS donated Studio 58's building to Educational Television for the Metropolitan Area, which became the national network NET in 1962 and PBS in 1970. They renamed it Studio 55, and taped Sesame Street and The Dick Cavett Show there. It was torn down in 2002, and the Joan Weill Center for Dance was opened by the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater on the site.
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October 18, 1953 was a Sunday. These NFL games were played:
* The San Francisco 49ers beat the Chicago Bears, 35-28 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Willie Thrower was sent in as a relief quarterback for the Bears, completing 3 of 8 passes, and thus became the 1st black man to play quarterback in the NFL. I have a separate entry for that event.
* The New York Giants beat the Chicago Cardinals, 21-7 at the Polo Grounds.
* The Cleveland Browns beat the Washington Redskins, 30-14 at Griffith Stadium in Washington.
* The Los Angeles Rams beat the Detroit Lions, 31-19 at Briggs Stadium (later Tiger Stadium) in Detroit.
* The Green Bay Packers beat the Baltimore Colts, 37-14 at Green Bay City Stadium in Green Bay, Wisconsin.
* The day before, Philadelphia Eagles beat the Pittsburgh Steelers, 23-7 at Connie Mack Stadium in Philadelphia.
Baseball season had ended 12 days earlier, with the New York Yankees winning the World Series, beating the Brooklyn Dodgers, in 6 games. The NBA season started 12 days later. The NHL's entire "Original Six" was in action:
* The New York Rangers lost to the Boston Bruins, 3-2 at the Boston Garden.
* The Detroit Red Wings beat the Montreal Canadiens, 4-0 at the Olympia Stadium in Detroit.
* And the Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Chicago Black Hawks, 2-1 at the Chicago Stadium.
