I saw the RSC's Henry VI/Richard III cycle on tour in Ann Arbor, Michigan when I was an undergraduate -- this was early 2001, so about six weeks after Bush's inauguration, and consequently the media (which was all over the place; we were the only U.S. venue for the production) was eager to draw parallels between the Wars of the Roses and the contentious 2000 election. At one point in Richard III, they brought the house lights up and Buckingham led the audience in a particularly enthusiastic exclamation of "Long live Richard, England's royal king!" A few days later, some of the actors came to speak to my Shakespeare class, and one thing they remarked upon was how much more demonstrative American audiences were: British audiences, they said, wouldn't acclaim Richard III; they just laughed. "But then," one of them said, "you did elect George Bush..."

I didn't think this was quite fair, as regardless of what one makes of the fiasco in Florida I doubt that many members of the audience in Ann Arbor voted for Bush (I certainly didn't) and anyway...well, what you said.

I do think it would be interesting to see how a Western audience responds to Richard III-as-Hussein (or Hussein-as-Richard III), since so much of the play's dynamic depends on the tension between our awareness of the evil of Richard's actions and our enthusiasm for the gusto with which he carries them out. I can't imagine many people who are going to the RSC's festival being willing to find Saddam Hussein a sympathetic/entertaining villain. (Of course, Ian McKellen's Hitleresque Richard III didn't seem to suffer on that account, but he also wasn't playing Richard as Hitler -- I'm not sure if this production actually makes it about Saddam or just is really informed by his rise to power, although the phrasing in the press release makes it sound like the former. Either way, though, I'm curious, at least.)