A man who conquered not a nation, but the human mind. “The greatest form of power is not to force someone to obey. The greatest form of power is to make them want to obey.” This production is not about the King of England. It is not about politics. It is not about history. It is not about evil. It is about the human psyche. Because every political system is first born in the human mind. Before a dictator emerges, there must be someone willing to believe in him. Before propaganda emerges, there must be someone for whom the truth becomes too difficult to bear. Before Richard emerges, there must be a society that grows tired of being free. That is why this play is not about a single monster. It is about us. The desire for power: when powerlessness becomes power. Why does a human being crave power?

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Friedrich Nietzsche argued that human beings are driven by the will to power. This idea is often misunderstood. It is not simply the desire to rule over others. It is the desire to overcome one's own powerlessness. Richard is not born out of strength. He is born out of humiliation. His childhood is marked by rejection. He has never experienced unconditional love. Therefore, he decides: if I cannot be loved, I will be feared. This is a classic transformation of trauma into power. Alfred Adler called this mechanism the compensation for feelings of inferiority. A person who deeply doubts their own worth often seeks absolute control. Therefore, Richard is not born evil. He is a man who can no longer endure his own pain and decides to project it onto the world. A narcissist who hates his own reflection. Drawing on the theories of Sigmund Freud, Richard does not possess a stable ego. More precisely, he has never managed to develop a coherent sense of self. Throughout his life, he searches for his reflection in the eyes of others. That is why he needs an audience. He needs a court. He needs enemies. He needs people. Not because he loves them, but because without them, he does not exist. A narcissist is not someone who loves themselves. A narcissist is someone who cannot stand themselves. That is why they are constantly searching for mirrors. And power becomes the greatest mirror of all.

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Michel Foucault: power without violence

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In ancient times, a king would have someone's head cut off. Today, he writes a new communications strategy. Michel Foucault wrote that modern power has become invisible. It does not merely punish — it shapes. It creates norms. It determines what is beautiful, what success is, what love is, what patriotism is, what constitutes a healthy person, what constitutes a normal body, and which opinions are acceptable. That is why the modern Richard rules through language first and foremost.

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Byung-Chul Han: psychopolitics

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Today, no one forces us to work. We exploit ourselves. We become projects. We constantly improve ourselves. We track our steps. We count our calories. We monitor our productivity. We construct our image. We sell ourselves. Richard does not even need to enslave us. We come willingly.

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René Girard: why does society need a scapegoat?

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René Girard argues that human communities stabilise themselves by finding someone to blame. When society experiences a crisis, it does not search for the cause of the problem. It searches for a person to blame. The migrant. The foreigner. The vulnerable. The dissenter. The traitor. Once one person has been sacrificed, everyone feels a little better for a while. That is why Richard constantly creates enemies. Not because he needs them, but because without them, his power would crumble.

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Hannah Arendt: the banality of evil

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This is one of the production's most important themes. Evil almost never arrives screaming. It arrives politely. In a suit. With a degree. With a smile. With a PowerPoint presentation. With a KPI (Key Performance Indicator). A KPI is a metric used to evaluate progress towards specific goals or results. In other words, if you have a particular goal, a KPI shows whether you are moving in the right direction and how much more needs to be done. Evil arrives under the guise of concern. A human being becomes a monster not because they hate, but because they stop thinking.

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Slavoj Žižek: the triumph of ideology

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Slavoj Žižek argues: “The greatest victory of ideology occurs when a person says, ‘I know it's a lie. But I live by it anyway.’” This is the tragedy of our time. We no longer believe in propaganda. But it continues to shape us.

 

 

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