King Lear

In 1986 Anthony Hopkins played Lear at the National Theatre, and it took such a toll on him that he stepped away from the stage soon afterwards. More than thirty years on he came back to the part in 'King Lear', Shakespeare's tragedy as adapted and directed by Richard Eyre for the BBC and Amazon, cut down to 115 minutes and moved to a present day London run as a military state.

Lear, a very old king, gathers his family to announce that he's stepping down and splitting the kingdom between his three daughters. Goneril and Regan try to outdo each other in flattering him and walk away with their share. Cordelia, the youngest, won't play along, and her father cuts her off on the spot.

Stripped of power but with his temper intact, the old man soon finds out how little his elder daughters' words were worth, just as his mind starts to go. Meanwhile, in the Earl of Gloucester's household, his illegitimate son Edmund schemes against his brother Edgar to take everything, and the country drifts towards war.

Emma Thompson and Emily Watson are Goneril and Regan, Florence Pugh is Cordelia and Jim Broadbent plays Gloucester, with Andrew Scott and John Macmillan as Edgar and Edmund. Jim Carter, Tobias Menzies, Christopher Eccleston and Karl Johnson, as the Fool, round out the cast. Eyre had already directed Hopkins in 'The Dresser' and Thompson in 'The Children Act'. It was shot in Stevenage and at Dover Castle, among other places.

It premiered on BBC Two on 28 May 2018 and reached Prime Video that September. It picked up an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Television Movie, and Hopkins was nominated by the Screen Actors Guild. It averages 73.1 out of 100 across twelve reviews on the site.

• Drama