Stratford, or: Hamlet
So… I believe there was something about a play?
Seriously now: it was superb. I made it to Stratford without a problem, reunited with bimo, and spent the rest of the afternoon strolling through Stratford and chatting. Incidentally, if you’re a new reader to these ramblings and want pictures, I posted some two years ago (try the “england” or “stratford” tag); yesterday was cloudy, and I didn’t do the sight seeing thing beyond strolling anyway.
Now, the production takes place in the Courtyard, which was packed. We had gallery seats, but, I’m happy to report, could see the actors’ expressions superbly, save for the occasional time when the crown lustres hid their heads. The crownlustres being one of the few bits of set decorations that existed; mainly it was just the black stage and the mirror-wall behind, where both Polonius and Claudius hid at various times. In the closet scene, when Hamlet hears Polonius, the mirror gets smashed and remains so for the reminder of the production.
Costume-wise, it was modern contemporary dress, except for the ghost, who was in medieval armour, and the play-within-a-play, which took place in elaborate Elizabethan costumes, with the player queen being indeed a young man. And while we’re talking looks, since I know certain people on my list really need to know: David Tennant’s hair starts out well-combed and moderate for the second scene where Claudius holds his speech and starts going wild immediately after he hears about the ghost, remaining wild for the rest of the production. Clearly, this is no BBC special effect. *g * (He also spent most of the play barefoot - as described by Ophelia - which made me think of versaphile, who knows why.)
Hamlet can be an incredibly suspenseful play if you let it, and this production did; they basically played it as a psychological thriller, no allusions to contemporary politics, though Fortinbras’ people in the two brief scenes we saw them in wore army uniforms. Patrick Stewart doing double duty as the Ghost and Claudius worked amazingly well; considering that he wore evening dress as Claudius and had a fake beard and hair and the armour as the ghost, and had to change from one into the other at the opening of the play fairly quickly, he must be really fast with the costuem changes. He played Claudius as a restrained, dignfied statesman early on, with the affectionate looks and gestures making clear the bond with Gertrude; the first crack during the performance of The Mousetrap, the play within a play, was played quite different from other productions. He didn’t fly into a rage/or panic but got up, crossed the stage to go to Hamlet, looked at him intently (and this was an incredibly intense scene, with Hamlet looking back in an ecstatic, terrible joy, but I’ll get to DT in a moment) and after that tense held silence left. Then later when Claudius is alone, his breakdown and the “Oh my offense is rank, it smells to heaven!” speech is all the more startling because of all the self-control before. I’ve always seen Claudius as one of the most interesting villains in Shakespeare; he’s not a megalomaniac, nor is he out to kill anyone, he doesn’t turn against Hamlet (Junior) until it’s clear Hamlet is a lethal threat to him, the love for Gertrude is real, he might well be a good king, and he’s definitely good at keeping his head in a crisis, see his talking Laertes out of killing him and into aiding him - but he did commit fratricide, and as he himself notes, it’s no good repenting if you want to keep the benefits of your murder. In the Kenneth Branagh film, they’re at least subtextually playing with the possibility that Claudius might be Hamlet’s biological father. Not so here, but you do get the impression Hamlet’s idolization of the late Hamlet Senior and hate for Claudius is a lot of projection, and the two have more in common than either is comfortable with. A little more than kin and less than kind, indeed. The death scene(s), too: in this production, you get the idea Gertrude realizes the cup is poisoned when Claudius warns her not to drink it and that’s why she does. Some productions I’ve seen had Gertrude turn against Claudius after the closet scene and behave coldly from that point onwards, but not this one. It has them being tender with each other quite until the end, but Gertrude going increasingly to pieces post-closet scene, with her loyalties split between husband and son. Hence the poison cup. And hence the way Hamlet at last kills Claudius: he doesn’t stab him or stuff his mouth with the poison, as I have seen before. Instead, when he says “drink this and follow my mother” he’s actually offering a choice (though he has his rapier pointed at Claudius when he hands him the cup) and Claudius does follow suit and drink, with it open to debate whether he does because he’s being forced and sees no way out, or whether he wants to. When he falls down, his hand is reaching for the dead Gertrude.
The entire ensemble was excellent, with Oliver Ford Davies playing Polonius mostly as comic relief but nonetheless getting across the paranoid control Polonius exerts (or tries to) over his children, and Penny Downe playing Gertrude in a similar manner to Patrick Stewart’s Claudius, going from outwards aspect - charming society hostess in her case - to inwards revelation in the later part of the play; I’ve already talked about the sense of being torn to pieces. When she says “oh Hamlet, you have split my heart in two” she means just that. She has a startling outburst of laughter during the closet scene; the emotional breakdown fever in Elsinore has gripped her, too.
Mariah Gale as Ophelia is playful with her brother Laertes in her early scenes and more determined and less wobbly in her first confrontation with Hamlet than other Ophelias I’ve seen, but during the play-within-a-play scene it’s already clear she’s brittle; then, when she’s mad, there is also a fury driving her, which is a fascinating take on the character, the madness usually being played in the sweet and gentle manner. But here Ophelia when mad has a rage that is no longer helpless as she directs it at Gertrude, Claudius, everyone.
Favourite theatre in joke detail: when Hamlet (and Horatio) have it out with Guildenstern and Rosenkrantz after the play-within-a-play, Hamlet actually plays on a lute, and what he plays is “Three blind mice”. Which is of course the melody that provides the biggest clue in Agatha Christie’s The Mousetrap, that play named after Hamlet’s play-within-a-play which we’ve just seen.
And now I’ve teased you enough. So, David Tennant as Hamlet. First I must say that filmed Hamlet performances - whether it’s Olivier or Branagh or, God forbid, Mel Gibson - which are the ones most people can be counted on having seen if they aren’t familiar with stage productions - have never really satisfied me, though Branagh comes closest. (But he still strikes me as too old and too self-conscious - and not in a way the character is.) Tennant’s Hamlet, otoh, I was completely happy with, and I don’t think it’s because of actor bias. Mind you, DT’s incredibly youthful face actually sells the “student from Wittenberg” thing whereas most actors simply look too old not just for being a student but for reacting to the loss of a father and the Gertrude/Claudius union the way Hamlet does, but that outward advantage wouldn’t have mattered if his acting hadn’t been good. Especially given the company he was in. Moments that particular stick to mind: the initial reunion with Horatio (the change of demeanour from Hamlet’s perfunctionary politeness to Marcellus and Bernardo to the glad hug he greets Horatio with) - in this production you see where Horatio’s loyalty comes from; his expression when he realises that he and Ophelia are being watched, and that Ophelia knows and lies to him (and again, the switch of demeanor then; I’ve seen Hamlets who were on to the game from the start and treated Ophelia accordingly, but here the first “get thee to a nunnery” is spoken as a genuine warning, and then after the “where is your father?” and Ophelia’s response it changes, by voice and expression alone, to angry disappointed lashing out and cruelty. The way Tennant made the big speeches and quotes, whether it was “to be or not to be” or “oh what a rogue and peasant slave” etc. flow out of whatever mood Hamlet was in. That incredible silent moment with Claudius after the play-within-a-play I already described. Which helps set up the later scene with Hamlet deciding not to kill Claudius while Claudius is praying (I always wonder about how many of the audience get what the reasoning - if Claudius is killed while repenting, he won’t go to hell - says about Hamlet, but it’s set up here, and the production actually made that scene the cliffhanger interval break in a very tv way: Hamlet comes across the praying Claudius, pulls his knife, and sudden darkness. Stay tuned for part II, audience. The Ophelia grave scene; it’s hard to play without either Hamlet coming across as absolutely insufferable or as mocking Laertes, but in this production I actually believed Hamlet had loved Ophelia (though not as much as his parents). The moments of sheer fun, as with Hamlet and the players (who basically were indulgent pros towards their amateur enthusiast patron), and the enthusiasm and wit which are as much a part of Hamlet as the grief and anger. The sudden quiet “if it were now…” etc. with Horatio before the duel scene that gave you the idea at this point Hamlet was indeed ready to die, and not in a half posing, half angry manner as he would have been at the start of the play. (Another thing: just as Claudius’ murder of his brother dooms him, and despite struggling against it he in a way knows it, you get the sense here Hamlet knows his killing of Polonius means his own death, though it has taken him until the duel notice to internalize it.) The duel scene, which startes with mannered fencing and then picks up vicious speed, and both DT and Edward Bennett, who plays Laertes and is DT’s understudy for Hamlet, make you believe in the genuineness of the fencing. (Go, fight coordinator Terry King.) Just - everything. A very, very happy viewer I.
Bimo and I sat near the aisle so were out of the playhouse pretty quickly and made our way to the stage door, but of course there was already a big crowd. Both Patrick Stewart and David Tennant came out for a bit and signed some autographs before calling it a night, but with the sheer mass of people, we just saw the back of Stewart’s bald head and his profile now and then; DT being a somewhat larger, his entire head was visible over the crowd now and then, and I might have gotten a photo (will have to check once I’m in London, I’m writing this on the train), but we weren’t surprised we didn’t make it to the front before they both left. After three and a half hours of performance, it was really nice to do a bit of fanservice at all. Speaking of the fans, as opposed to certain clichés in the press, everyone was well-behaved, both during the performance (i.e. no reactions that didn’t have to do with what was presented on stage, no photos) and later in front of the stage door. Which, despite the lethal ending of the play, left everyone in a great mood as we wandered away and back to our hotels.
Lastly: according to the programm, the sound designer, one Jeremy Dunn, “is working on a musical version of Doctor Who”. Oh really?
ETA: And here are what pictures I got:
And thus I greet y'all from Stratford:
Seriously now: it was superb. I made it to Stratford without a problem, reunited with bimo, and spent the rest of the afternoon strolling through Stratford and chatting. Incidentally, if you’re a new reader to these ramblings and want pictures, I posted some two years ago (try the “england” or “stratford” tag); yesterday was cloudy, and I didn’t do the sight seeing thing beyond strolling anyway.
Now, the production takes place in the Courtyard, which was packed. We had gallery seats, but, I’m happy to report, could see the actors’ expressions superbly, save for the occasional time when the crown lustres hid their heads. The crownlustres being one of the few bits of set decorations that existed; mainly it was just the black stage and the mirror-wall behind, where both Polonius and Claudius hid at various times. In the closet scene, when Hamlet hears Polonius, the mirror gets smashed and remains so for the reminder of the production.
Costume-wise, it was modern contemporary dress, except for the ghost, who was in medieval armour, and the play-within-a-play, which took place in elaborate Elizabethan costumes, with the player queen being indeed a young man. And while we’re talking looks, since I know certain people on my list really need to know: David Tennant’s hair starts out well-combed and moderate for the second scene where Claudius holds his speech and starts going wild immediately after he hears about the ghost, remaining wild for the rest of the production. Clearly, this is no BBC special effect. *g * (He also spent most of the play barefoot - as described by Ophelia - which made me think of versaphile, who knows why.)
Hamlet can be an incredibly suspenseful play if you let it, and this production did; they basically played it as a psychological thriller, no allusions to contemporary politics, though Fortinbras’ people in the two brief scenes we saw them in wore army uniforms. Patrick Stewart doing double duty as the Ghost and Claudius worked amazingly well; considering that he wore evening dress as Claudius and had a fake beard and hair and the armour as the ghost, and had to change from one into the other at the opening of the play fairly quickly, he must be really fast with the costuem changes. He played Claudius as a restrained, dignfied statesman early on, with the affectionate looks and gestures making clear the bond with Gertrude; the first crack during the performance of The Mousetrap, the play within a play, was played quite different from other productions. He didn’t fly into a rage/or panic but got up, crossed the stage to go to Hamlet, looked at him intently (and this was an incredibly intense scene, with Hamlet looking back in an ecstatic, terrible joy, but I’ll get to DT in a moment) and after that tense held silence left. Then later when Claudius is alone, his breakdown and the “Oh my offense is rank, it smells to heaven!” speech is all the more startling because of all the self-control before. I’ve always seen Claudius as one of the most interesting villains in Shakespeare; he’s not a megalomaniac, nor is he out to kill anyone, he doesn’t turn against Hamlet (Junior) until it’s clear Hamlet is a lethal threat to him, the love for Gertrude is real, he might well be a good king, and he’s definitely good at keeping his head in a crisis, see his talking Laertes out of killing him and into aiding him - but he did commit fratricide, and as he himself notes, it’s no good repenting if you want to keep the benefits of your murder. In the Kenneth Branagh film, they’re at least subtextually playing with the possibility that Claudius might be Hamlet’s biological father. Not so here, but you do get the impression Hamlet’s idolization of the late Hamlet Senior and hate for Claudius is a lot of projection, and the two have more in common than either is comfortable with. A little more than kin and less than kind, indeed. The death scene(s), too: in this production, you get the idea Gertrude realizes the cup is poisoned when Claudius warns her not to drink it and that’s why she does. Some productions I’ve seen had Gertrude turn against Claudius after the closet scene and behave coldly from that point onwards, but not this one. It has them being tender with each other quite until the end, but Gertrude going increasingly to pieces post-closet scene, with her loyalties split between husband and son. Hence the poison cup. And hence the way Hamlet at last kills Claudius: he doesn’t stab him or stuff his mouth with the poison, as I have seen before. Instead, when he says “drink this and follow my mother” he’s actually offering a choice (though he has his rapier pointed at Claudius when he hands him the cup) and Claudius does follow suit and drink, with it open to debate whether he does because he’s being forced and sees no way out, or whether he wants to. When he falls down, his hand is reaching for the dead Gertrude.
The entire ensemble was excellent, with Oliver Ford Davies playing Polonius mostly as comic relief but nonetheless getting across the paranoid control Polonius exerts (or tries to) over his children, and Penny Downe playing Gertrude in a similar manner to Patrick Stewart’s Claudius, going from outwards aspect - charming society hostess in her case - to inwards revelation in the later part of the play; I’ve already talked about the sense of being torn to pieces. When she says “oh Hamlet, you have split my heart in two” she means just that. She has a startling outburst of laughter during the closet scene; the emotional breakdown fever in Elsinore has gripped her, too.
Mariah Gale as Ophelia is playful with her brother Laertes in her early scenes and more determined and less wobbly in her first confrontation with Hamlet than other Ophelias I’ve seen, but during the play-within-a-play scene it’s already clear she’s brittle; then, when she’s mad, there is also a fury driving her, which is a fascinating take on the character, the madness usually being played in the sweet and gentle manner. But here Ophelia when mad has a rage that is no longer helpless as she directs it at Gertrude, Claudius, everyone.
Favourite theatre in joke detail: when Hamlet (and Horatio) have it out with Guildenstern and Rosenkrantz after the play-within-a-play, Hamlet actually plays on a lute, and what he plays is “Three blind mice”. Which is of course the melody that provides the biggest clue in Agatha Christie’s The Mousetrap, that play named after Hamlet’s play-within-a-play which we’ve just seen.
And now I’ve teased you enough. So, David Tennant as Hamlet. First I must say that filmed Hamlet performances - whether it’s Olivier or Branagh or, God forbid, Mel Gibson - which are the ones most people can be counted on having seen if they aren’t familiar with stage productions - have never really satisfied me, though Branagh comes closest. (But he still strikes me as too old and too self-conscious - and not in a way the character is.) Tennant’s Hamlet, otoh, I was completely happy with, and I don’t think it’s because of actor bias. Mind you, DT’s incredibly youthful face actually sells the “student from Wittenberg” thing whereas most actors simply look too old not just for being a student but for reacting to the loss of a father and the Gertrude/Claudius union the way Hamlet does, but that outward advantage wouldn’t have mattered if his acting hadn’t been good. Especially given the company he was in. Moments that particular stick to mind: the initial reunion with Horatio (the change of demeanour from Hamlet’s perfunctionary politeness to Marcellus and Bernardo to the glad hug he greets Horatio with) - in this production you see where Horatio’s loyalty comes from; his expression when he realises that he and Ophelia are being watched, and that Ophelia knows and lies to him (and again, the switch of demeanor then; I’ve seen Hamlets who were on to the game from the start and treated Ophelia accordingly, but here the first “get thee to a nunnery” is spoken as a genuine warning, and then after the “where is your father?” and Ophelia’s response it changes, by voice and expression alone, to angry disappointed lashing out and cruelty. The way Tennant made the big speeches and quotes, whether it was “to be or not to be” or “oh what a rogue and peasant slave” etc. flow out of whatever mood Hamlet was in. That incredible silent moment with Claudius after the play-within-a-play I already described. Which helps set up the later scene with Hamlet deciding not to kill Claudius while Claudius is praying (I always wonder about how many of the audience get what the reasoning - if Claudius is killed while repenting, he won’t go to hell - says about Hamlet, but it’s set up here, and the production actually made that scene the cliffhanger interval break in a very tv way: Hamlet comes across the praying Claudius, pulls his knife, and sudden darkness. Stay tuned for part II, audience. The Ophelia grave scene; it’s hard to play without either Hamlet coming across as absolutely insufferable or as mocking Laertes, but in this production I actually believed Hamlet had loved Ophelia (though not as much as his parents). The moments of sheer fun, as with Hamlet and the players (who basically were indulgent pros towards their amateur enthusiast patron), and the enthusiasm and wit which are as much a part of Hamlet as the grief and anger. The sudden quiet “if it were now…” etc. with Horatio before the duel scene that gave you the idea at this point Hamlet was indeed ready to die, and not in a half posing, half angry manner as he would have been at the start of the play. (Another thing: just as Claudius’ murder of his brother dooms him, and despite struggling against it he in a way knows it, you get the sense here Hamlet knows his killing of Polonius means his own death, though it has taken him until the duel notice to internalize it.) The duel scene, which startes with mannered fencing and then picks up vicious speed, and both DT and Edward Bennett, who plays Laertes and is DT’s understudy for Hamlet, make you believe in the genuineness of the fencing. (Go, fight coordinator Terry King.) Just - everything. A very, very happy viewer I.
Bimo and I sat near the aisle so were out of the playhouse pretty quickly and made our way to the stage door, but of course there was already a big crowd. Both Patrick Stewart and David Tennant came out for a bit and signed some autographs before calling it a night, but with the sheer mass of people, we just saw the back of Stewart’s bald head and his profile now and then; DT being a somewhat larger, his entire head was visible over the crowd now and then, and I might have gotten a photo (will have to check once I’m in London, I’m writing this on the train), but we weren’t surprised we didn’t make it to the front before they both left. After three and a half hours of performance, it was really nice to do a bit of fanservice at all. Speaking of the fans, as opposed to certain clichés in the press, everyone was well-behaved, both during the performance (i.e. no reactions that didn’t have to do with what was presented on stage, no photos) and later in front of the stage door. Which, despite the lethal ending of the play, left everyone in a great mood as we wandered away and back to our hotels.
Lastly: according to the programm, the sound designer, one Jeremy Dunn, “is working on a musical version of Doctor Who”. Oh really?
ETA: And here are what pictures I got:
And thus I greet y'all from Stratford:
