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Director Craig Baldwin doesn’t see his version of Richard II <\/em>as a revisionist look at the Shakespeare play, but rather as a reclamation of the queer history already embedded in the material<\/a>.<\/p>\n Being able to shift queerness to the forefront of a play like this, he says, is one of his proudest achievements because it doesn’t distort the show’s meaning. Rather, it enhances it to emphasize an issue queer people<\/a> grapple with daily: power. How does one wield power? Who do you have to step on to gain it? And how do you lose power? These are the sorts of topics that Baldwin set out to examine in his new show, which opened at Astor Place Theater on Monday.<\/p>\n Many of Shakespeare’s works are about the monarchy, but more specifically about how terrible it is to be a king. Richard II <\/em>is no different; Michael Urie<\/a> of Ugly Betty<\/em> and Shrinking<\/em> fame plays the titular role. The Once Upon a Mattress<\/em> star <\/a>was ecstatic to take the helm of this project as the lead because Shakespearean works present epic opportunities for an actor.<\/p>\n “Every time I do a Shakespeare play, I think \u2018All I wanna do is Shakespeare\u2019 because it\u2019s so rich,” Urie says. “There\u2019s so much going on, the stakes are so much higher than most other kinds of plays, and you get this incredible work. And with Shakespeare, he creates an engine for you with the language, so if you’re in the pocket doing it, it’s like you’re flying. It\u2019s really like a drug.”<\/p>\n