![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pameladeanI got the tickets in October of last year. I had forgotten in the interim how much I had splurged for good close seats. I was very glad that I had done so. We were in Aisle 5, Row C. Eric and I have both been obsessed with the play in different ways, and he had never seen it on stage. I had not seen a stage production for quite some time.
The stage was surrounded by rubble -- boards, broken doors, bits of statuary, beams of wood, all dark gray shading to black, as if it had all been burned. In the middle was a life-sized apparently-bronzed statue holding out one arm, palm down, all dressed for war in a slightly more antique fashion than the actual soldiers in the production itself. We assumed that it was old Hamlet, and it was. They began the opening scene offstage and entered through the aisle next to us, which was very effective. The lines were cut to the bone and perhaps a bit more than that. I had trouble because my head went on repeating entire speeches long after the actors had passed many pages into the heart of the act. The ghost was done fairly plainly, with a bit of fog and a bit of reverberation, but nothing too drastic. I thought that things moved a little too fast, but I am so resistant to cuts even when necessary that this is not a reliable opinion. I liked the Horatio; he looked earnest and reliable and a little lost but not about to admit it.
At the back of the stage was a set with double swing doors on the stage level and two staircases leading each in a single switchback to a balcony with windows and more doors at the back. This set was used very effectively over and over; people were always trying hard to go away, heading up the stairs or through the doors, and then being called back. One knew when it would happen if one knew the play, and the sensation of people's being trapped against their will was very strong at times.
At the opening of Act I, Scene 2, Claudius and Gertrude were up on the balcony, with courtiers scattered about on the stage proper. Photographers with huge cameras knelt and let off blinding flashes as the light came up. On the lefthand set of steps a young man in a black raincoat was sitting, scribbling in a notebook. There was no reason that he could not have been a reporter, but both Eric and I knew that he was Hamlet. I was able to pick out Ophelia at once, in her little knee-length chiffony dress and evil fifties pumps. I'm not actually sure when the production was set, but the clothing affected me, all of it, as those shoes did. Evil fifties garments. Claudius was very brisk and slick. I wondered at once whether his performance owed anything to Patrick Stewart's in the BBC Compleat Shakespeare production; something in the assurance and cadence of his voice echoed it. Laertes's lines were cut severely, and so were Polonius's, but the extreme fluency that the actor playing Polonius brought to his part was already in evidence.
When Hamlet did his first soliloquy, I found myself thinking, "That kid is seriously high-strung." Then I remembered Gertrude, who was played by a tall willowy nervous-looking blonde woman, and thought, "That's where he gets it." This emotional resemblance -- the actors playing Gertrude and Hamlet did not look at all alike, though there was a similarity amongst Hamlet, Claudius, and the ghost -- was reinforced throughout the play. I kept being persuaded that those two people really were related. Eric told me later that he very much appreciated the natural, unstagy way Hamlet dealt with the many exclamations in that first soliloquy.
The family scene with Laertes and Ophelia was also cut, but not to ribbons, and was charmingly done. Ophelia managed to sound intelligent, which is not the easiest thing in the world with her lines. Laertes came across as a loving brother in a nasty patriarchal way, which was a bit creepy, though overall the scene was played for laughs and was in fact amusing. Then Polonius came in. He used for the first time his signature gesture in this production, a clap of the hands followed pointing with one hand at the location he wished the person he was addressing to go to, emphasized by a snap of the fingers of the pointing hand. It was as if he were training a dog. This too was very creepy, and yet the basic interactions of the family members were affectionate. After Laertes left, Ophelia tried to vanish through the lower doors with the letter she had been nursing thoughout the scene, and was called back by Polonius's, "What is't, Ophelia, he hath said to you?" It would be hard to say whether Polonius's nasty patriarchal attitudes were worse than Laertes's, or not, but certainly his authority was acknowledged by Ophelia as Laertes's was not. The broad outline of this scene was not much different from what I've seen in many productions, but the delicacy of Ophelia's responses was remarkable, and the scene seemed to come into very sharp focus, despite the cuts. I'm afraid that, because of later cuts in Laertes's lines, it was really the only time that that character seemed real. I don't blame the actor.
The second ghost scene was also severely cut, though at least they did leave in Horatio's "What if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord?" and most of what came after. It was marked mainly by a genuinely shocking moment when Hamlet grabbed Marcellus's gun as he cried, "Unhand me, gentlemen. By heaven, I'll make a ghost of him that lets me." The reactions of Horatio and Marcellus were very good.
Hamlet's private colloquy with the ghost was also cut down, much too far, in my opinion. They also trimmed the scene just after when Hamlet leads Horatio and Marcellus a not-so-merry chase; and they cut way back on the reiterated "Swear" of the ghost and Hamlet's frenzied humorous response. It was all so compressed that, though the very basic elements of what had happened, the justification for Horatio's and Marcellus's keeping quiet and the suggestion that Hamlet intends to put an antic disposition on, were kept, they went by quickly, the scene was disjointed, and no real trace of human interaction remained. Here as later they had to cut references to Hamlet's sword, since he was not carrying one.
The scene between Polonius and Reynaldo was so truncated that it served no purpose at all and might as well have been tossed. Ophelia's "My lord, my lord, I have been so affrighted" was well done. They sensibly cut the specific references to garments, since Hamlet was not wearing a doublet and stockings. Polonius and Ophelia were very good together, creating a sense of conviction that actually distracted me from which lines had been cut.
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern were very young, amiable, and slightly befuddled. One of them wore glasses, but I can't recall which. The whole scene was creepy, because they seemed utterly naive and unsuspecting and Claudius seemed already to be planning something darker than anything he actually said. Gertrude was good, seeming to collect herself in order to be charming to them. Cornelius and Voltemand were allowed to keep most of their lines -- lines pertaining to Fortinbras were generally kept, at least enough to emphasize the outline, throughout this production, though to an end that we didn't care for at all. Then Polonius embarked on his elaborate revelation about the cause of Hamlet's madness. He was surprisingly persuasive and sharp -- they cut "by the Mass, I was about to say something" -- but it was Gertrude who really made the scene, by pressing her fingers to her forehead as if (I am obliged to Eric for this image) she were coming down with a migraine. This was another occasion on which I believed that she and Hamlet shared a character trait.
The "words, words, words" scene between Hamlet and Polonius was not remarkable, except that Polonius again managed not to seem doddering or foolish. I think this was one of the times when Hamlet made a lightning change from amiable to deeply hostile, though of course later on there are more important ones. Eric noticed this aspect of the characterization. It was part of the way Polonius managed not to seem foolish and Hamlet seemed unpredictable and dangerous.
The scene with Hamlet, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern was delightful. R and G had brought a sixpack of beer, which Hamlet indicated when he said, "What have you, my good friends [hoisting a bottle of beer] deserved at the hands of Fortune that she sends you to prison here?" The lines "Her privates, we" and "But thinking makes it so" were said in chorus by all three, clearly as jokes native to Wittenberg. You could see that Rosencrantz was making a big mistake when he answered Hamlet's question by saying, "To visit you, my lord, no other occasion," and after that Hamlet did one of those lightning changes to hostility, which upset R and G very much. They were clearly reluctant participants even in the benign plot of Gertrude to cheer up her son. Rosencrantz's remarks about the players were made very nervously, as if he were not at all sure that this strange Hamlet would still like the theater.
I am sorry to say that I don't remember very much about the "O what a rogue and peasant slave am I" soliloquy.
I'm going to stop now and put the rest in another entry, trying for an uneasy compromise between swamping people's Friends Pages and annoying the readers who don't like cut tags.
P.
The stage was surrounded by rubble -- boards, broken doors, bits of statuary, beams of wood, all dark gray shading to black, as if it had all been burned. In the middle was a life-sized apparently-bronzed statue holding out one arm, palm down, all dressed for war in a slightly more antique fashion than the actual soldiers in the production itself. We assumed that it was old Hamlet, and it was. They began the opening scene offstage and entered through the aisle next to us, which was very effective. The lines were cut to the bone and perhaps a bit more than that. I had trouble because my head went on repeating entire speeches long after the actors had passed many pages into the heart of the act. The ghost was done fairly plainly, with a bit of fog and a bit of reverberation, but nothing too drastic. I thought that things moved a little too fast, but I am so resistant to cuts even when necessary that this is not a reliable opinion. I liked the Horatio; he looked earnest and reliable and a little lost but not about to admit it.
At the back of the stage was a set with double swing doors on the stage level and two staircases leading each in a single switchback to a balcony with windows and more doors at the back. This set was used very effectively over and over; people were always trying hard to go away, heading up the stairs or through the doors, and then being called back. One knew when it would happen if one knew the play, and the sensation of people's being trapped against their will was very strong at times.
At the opening of Act I, Scene 2, Claudius and Gertrude were up on the balcony, with courtiers scattered about on the stage proper. Photographers with huge cameras knelt and let off blinding flashes as the light came up. On the lefthand set of steps a young man in a black raincoat was sitting, scribbling in a notebook. There was no reason that he could not have been a reporter, but both Eric and I knew that he was Hamlet. I was able to pick out Ophelia at once, in her little knee-length chiffony dress and evil fifties pumps. I'm not actually sure when the production was set, but the clothing affected me, all of it, as those shoes did. Evil fifties garments. Claudius was very brisk and slick. I wondered at once whether his performance owed anything to Patrick Stewart's in the BBC Compleat Shakespeare production; something in the assurance and cadence of his voice echoed it. Laertes's lines were cut severely, and so were Polonius's, but the extreme fluency that the actor playing Polonius brought to his part was already in evidence.
When Hamlet did his first soliloquy, I found myself thinking, "That kid is seriously high-strung." Then I remembered Gertrude, who was played by a tall willowy nervous-looking blonde woman, and thought, "That's where he gets it." This emotional resemblance -- the actors playing Gertrude and Hamlet did not look at all alike, though there was a similarity amongst Hamlet, Claudius, and the ghost -- was reinforced throughout the play. I kept being persuaded that those two people really were related. Eric told me later that he very much appreciated the natural, unstagy way Hamlet dealt with the many exclamations in that first soliloquy.
The family scene with Laertes and Ophelia was also cut, but not to ribbons, and was charmingly done. Ophelia managed to sound intelligent, which is not the easiest thing in the world with her lines. Laertes came across as a loving brother in a nasty patriarchal way, which was a bit creepy, though overall the scene was played for laughs and was in fact amusing. Then Polonius came in. He used for the first time his signature gesture in this production, a clap of the hands followed pointing with one hand at the location he wished the person he was addressing to go to, emphasized by a snap of the fingers of the pointing hand. It was as if he were training a dog. This too was very creepy, and yet the basic interactions of the family members were affectionate. After Laertes left, Ophelia tried to vanish through the lower doors with the letter she had been nursing thoughout the scene, and was called back by Polonius's, "What is't, Ophelia, he hath said to you?" It would be hard to say whether Polonius's nasty patriarchal attitudes were worse than Laertes's, or not, but certainly his authority was acknowledged by Ophelia as Laertes's was not. The broad outline of this scene was not much different from what I've seen in many productions, but the delicacy of Ophelia's responses was remarkable, and the scene seemed to come into very sharp focus, despite the cuts. I'm afraid that, because of later cuts in Laertes's lines, it was really the only time that that character seemed real. I don't blame the actor.
The second ghost scene was also severely cut, though at least they did leave in Horatio's "What if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord?" and most of what came after. It was marked mainly by a genuinely shocking moment when Hamlet grabbed Marcellus's gun as he cried, "Unhand me, gentlemen. By heaven, I'll make a ghost of him that lets me." The reactions of Horatio and Marcellus were very good.
Hamlet's private colloquy with the ghost was also cut down, much too far, in my opinion. They also trimmed the scene just after when Hamlet leads Horatio and Marcellus a not-so-merry chase; and they cut way back on the reiterated "Swear" of the ghost and Hamlet's frenzied humorous response. It was all so compressed that, though the very basic elements of what had happened, the justification for Horatio's and Marcellus's keeping quiet and the suggestion that Hamlet intends to put an antic disposition on, were kept, they went by quickly, the scene was disjointed, and no real trace of human interaction remained. Here as later they had to cut references to Hamlet's sword, since he was not carrying one.
The scene between Polonius and Reynaldo was so truncated that it served no purpose at all and might as well have been tossed. Ophelia's "My lord, my lord, I have been so affrighted" was well done. They sensibly cut the specific references to garments, since Hamlet was not wearing a doublet and stockings. Polonius and Ophelia were very good together, creating a sense of conviction that actually distracted me from which lines had been cut.
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern were very young, amiable, and slightly befuddled. One of them wore glasses, but I can't recall which. The whole scene was creepy, because they seemed utterly naive and unsuspecting and Claudius seemed already to be planning something darker than anything he actually said. Gertrude was good, seeming to collect herself in order to be charming to them. Cornelius and Voltemand were allowed to keep most of their lines -- lines pertaining to Fortinbras were generally kept, at least enough to emphasize the outline, throughout this production, though to an end that we didn't care for at all. Then Polonius embarked on his elaborate revelation about the cause of Hamlet's madness. He was surprisingly persuasive and sharp -- they cut "by the Mass, I was about to say something" -- but it was Gertrude who really made the scene, by pressing her fingers to her forehead as if (I am obliged to Eric for this image) she were coming down with a migraine. This was another occasion on which I believed that she and Hamlet shared a character trait.
The "words, words, words" scene between Hamlet and Polonius was not remarkable, except that Polonius again managed not to seem doddering or foolish. I think this was one of the times when Hamlet made a lightning change from amiable to deeply hostile, though of course later on there are more important ones. Eric noticed this aspect of the characterization. It was part of the way Polonius managed not to seem foolish and Hamlet seemed unpredictable and dangerous.
The scene with Hamlet, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern was delightful. R and G had brought a sixpack of beer, which Hamlet indicated when he said, "What have you, my good friends [hoisting a bottle of beer] deserved at the hands of Fortune that she sends you to prison here?" The lines "Her privates, we" and "But thinking makes it so" were said in chorus by all three, clearly as jokes native to Wittenberg. You could see that Rosencrantz was making a big mistake when he answered Hamlet's question by saying, "To visit you, my lord, no other occasion," and after that Hamlet did one of those lightning changes to hostility, which upset R and G very much. They were clearly reluctant participants even in the benign plot of Gertrude to cheer up her son. Rosencrantz's remarks about the players were made very nervously, as if he were not at all sure that this strange Hamlet would still like the theater.
I am sorry to say that I don't remember very much about the "O what a rogue and peasant slave am I" soliloquy.
I'm going to stop now and put the rest in another entry, trying for an uneasy compromise between swamping people's Friends Pages and annoying the readers who don't like cut tags.
P.
