MICHAEL Pennington sees his relationship with Shakespeare as “like a long marriage; you need a break every now and again”.

But despite flirtations with TV and films, and a more passionate affair with the likes of Chekhov and Ibsen, the 72-year-old has returned time and time again to the Bard.

“Only the passing of time is against me now so when I run out of steam then I will stop, but that hasn’t happened yet. I don’t find the tragedies physically or mentally tiring.

“It’s my job even if Lear is an immense part and I still seem to have the energy.”

His two-year fight to bring Lear over here from New York where it debuted, was much more exhausting, but his battle has finally paid off with a ten-week UK tour already on the road with the rave reviews preceding it as the famous work reaches York's Grand Opera House next week.

Indeed, Pennington is already said to be “simply the best” before it even leaves Northampton. But then having spent a lifetime perfecting the part, so he should be, something he acknowledges himself: “I am much more confident now. I have a lot of experience and know what I’m doing. But I am too immersed in King Lear to think about that now.”

It is, however, a total coincidence that Pennington’s King Lear is on tour during this, the Bard’s 400 centenary year.

“I don’t think it did us any harm though, and they do say you should play Hamlet in your 30s, Macbeth in your 60s and Lear in your 70s – so it’s all going to plan,. And considering I first played a spear carrier at the RSC in 1964 on the 400th anniversary of his birth and now here I am on the 400 anniversary of his death playing Lear – it’s rather pleasing, although I cannot deny that Shakespeare has been a big part of my life.”

So how does Pennington get into a part like King Lear? “It’s like cooking a stew very slowly. You start planning it and thinking about it, learning your lines, noticing things that are applicable in the news, watching people around you, especially the elderly or anyone with dementia or Alzheimer's.

The quote "humanity must perforce prey on itself like monsters of the deep”, applies everywhere,” he adds, “and soon it takes over your life because Lear is all around you. As an actor you are immersed but aware of what is going on around you so it’s a very schizophrenic existence. You have to be open and receptive.”

But how does he deal with the famously brutal and depressing play? “I always think it’s like going to watch someone singing the blues because the language is so poetic, it’s Shakespeare at the top of his game. It’s exciting not depressing, even if it is a beast of a play, and I defy anyone to leave without feeling uplifted .”

Not making any concessions to his age, Pennington does however concede that he hasn’t toured like this since the 1980s when he started the English Shakespeare Company, winding it down eventually six years later “because of sheer exhaustion".

“The RSC and National weren’t touring enough so unless you went to Stratford or London you didn’t get to see the big Shakespeare productions. We saw a gap in the market and acted on it. Before New York I last played Edgar in Lear at the RSC, with Donald Sinden, so I had to learn the part all over again so its always a lovely surprise to get a second shot at it.”

It was, however, "The Scottish play" which is responsible for Pennington’s enduring love story with Shakespeare. His unwitting mother taking her 11 year-old son to see a production which “signed the deal for life.

“I was taken to Macbeth when I was 11, under duress. All I cared about at the time was Tottenham Hotspur. I sat there in a terrible temper and then the lights went down. There was terrifying blood-curdling scream and the lights came up and there was this man, a soldier, completely covered in blood who fell down dead and from behind three boulders three weird sisters appeared. I was completely riveted from the start and I did not move all evening

“I even went home afterwards and insisted on finding a copy of Macbeth and doing it all again for my poor parents who didn’t know what they’d done. I think it was something to do with the blood and the gore and the ghosts, no question of that. But there was something in the language I heard that hit me in the guts. It was like discovering rock and roll.

“The only way to teach Shakespeare is to give students the sensation of actually saying the words and likewise to get them to see a production and hope that it’s not a bad one.”

So what’s the attraction? “They are the most wonderful adventure stories which is why people come back to see them again and again.”

And will his Shakespeare diet vary? “I will play Lear for as long as they want me too but after that I might need a lie down and a rest, or maybe a bit part in a movie, that would be nice.”

n King Kear, Grand Opera House, York. Monday (May 23) to Saturday (May 28). Box Office: 0844-871-3024 pr atgtickets.com/york