Adaptação e Re-Criação de Ricardo III, de Al Pacino

Abstract

This paper aims to analyze some in the movie Looking for Richard, directed and produced by Al Pacino (1996). The movie is characterized by Al Pacino as a docu-drama, once it presents the steps, choices and needed knowledge for the actors to find out the convincing poetical expression to this play by Shakespeare. In order to point out some elements of Shakespeare’s creative work I will analyze some traits present in Shakespeare’s work, such as the learning years at the Grammar School, the influence of the Homilies read at church at Shakespeare’s time, the Chronicles of Holinshed and his experience as an actor at the theater, which in certain sense enable us to pin down an idea of how Shakespeare used to work. Those traits may convey a possible poetics of the dramatist, even though Shakespeare never left any poetical work written which could define and describe his literary creation. After that, I will discuss some poetical cinematographic issues employed by Al Pacina and his co-workers in order to recreate and adapt the play Richard III. Among them, it is worth enhancing the actors’ difficulty in playing Shakespeare, his language and use of fancy word which cannot be dissociated from the actual meaning inherited in the play.