Hamlet: Read vs. Watched
The characters of William Shakespeare’s Hamlet are unique and diverse. They all have different motives for what they are doing and different views of the life shaking chain of events that unfold around them throughout the play. Many of Shakespeare’s works have been adapted into many different forms of media and literature. This particular script is one of his most famous and most popular. One of the best done retellings of this piece is the production put on and filmed by The Royal Shakespeare Company. The set and costumes seem to have the modern appearance that one would expect to see in the home of a present day foreign royal family. I watched cliups of the royal wedding and was quite pleased to see the similarities in their clothing. Although the script is the same in the written play as in the taped production, certain characters come off in different manners due to the physical expressions and movements that can be seen by the audience. The some of the characters, although some more complex than others, remained the same in both versions of the play. I was able to understand the characters better once I saw facial expressions and physical movements that went along with a particular person or line of the play, but my opinions and views on them did not suffer any insignificant or otherwise dramatic changes after viewing the movie. Queen Gertrude still remained the somewhat cunning women who married her brother-in-law to keep hold of her title, but in the end fell prey to the devious world surrounding her.