Steven Berkoff was asked to direct Shakespeare's Richard II in New York early 1994. It was a project he found fascinating: performing an Elizabethan play within the scrapers of Manhattan and the still rotting slums of the Lower East Side, between the steaming breath oozing out from the cracked pipes and the brutality of modern New York speak. New York became the backdrop and the energy centre which charged him each day and fed his inspiration. This book offers a wonderful insight into the many characters, challenges and places that were integral to the project and details how gradually the...