Hamlet In Brief

This week's brief post is largely from F.E. Halliday.  His essay entitled "The Poetry of Shakespeare's Plays" is one of the entries in Hamlet:  Enter Critic, cited numerous times in the blog (see 7/29/13 and others).  It is not Halliday's discussion of the poetry that is the topic here; rather it is a statement that appears early in the excerpt.  It is only three sentences in length, although one is a glorious run-on.  For me, it summarizes well why many people, myself included, find Hamlet to be so worthwhile.

"Hamlet is the great landmark in Shakespeare's progress, standing like a rock, conspicuous and unmistakably defined, exactly in the middle of his career.  In sheer bulk it is much the biggest of the plays; the hero is the most famous in all literature, partly because we all tend to identify ourselves with him, partly because in Hamlet we seem to come closest to Shakespeare himself; the imagery is distinctive both in form and content; it is the first of the series of great tragedies; and it is the first play in which Shakespeare's mature style is clearly revealed.  All his previous work was, in a sense, a preparation for Hamlet; no other subject had made such demands, and it is as though Shakespeare, feeling himself at last equal to the task, decided that the time had come to show the world what he really could do."

Hamlet the Silent Prince(ss)

A Tuesday evening silent film festival seems hardly the place to find Hamlet, and yet there he was again.  The George Eastman House's (GEH) Dryden Theatre aired the 1921 version of Hamlet, starring Asta Nielsen in the title role.  The film was accompanied live on piano by Philip Carli, who also provided a brief introduction.  The 35-mm print from the collection of GEH is the tenth film version of Hamlet, the first having been produced in 1908.  What sets this version apart is the star.  Asta Nielsen is a Danish actress.  This film is not, as Dr. Carli put it, a “trouser role.”  Namely, Nielsen does not play a male role as did Kelli Fox at Geva Theatre (see 7/21/13 post).  Hamlet in this film is female, and therein lies the mystery.

For a 93-year old film, it has held up surprisingly well.  It was shot in part at the actual Castle Elsinore, and the scenery adds a dimension to the work not seen live on stage.  This particular print was also in great shape for its age, although it was apparent that some of the intertitles were not original to the print.  Seeing the film with a live piano accompaniment definitely made it a memorable (and one time only) experience.

And then there was the story…  Shakespeare’s Hamlet this is not.  The film opens with Norway and Denmark at war.  The elder Fortinbras is slain by the elder Hamlet, who suffers a wound thought to be mortal.  Meanwhile, Gertrude gives birth to a daughter.  When she hears that her husband is near death, she and her nurse hatch a scheme to allow her to remain the queen.  Her child will be announced as a prince.  Her husband does not die, and he has to be brought into the royal deception.

Hamlet grows up keeping the secret of his gender.  Eventually, he heads off to Wittenberg, where he meets fellow classmates Horatio, young Fortinbras and Laertes.  They all become fast friends.  Back home, Gertrude has fallen for Claudius and the two conspire to kill her husband with an adder from the castle dungeon.  Hamlet is summoned home for his father’s funeral.

Hamlet learns that the adder that killed his father was similar to those found in the dungeon.  While investigating, he discovers Claudius’s dagger and intuits that his father had been murdered.  (No ghost ever appears.)  He decides to “put on an antic disposition.”  He is introduced to Ophelia, but he has no feelings for her.  He is drawn to Horatio instead.  When Hamlet discovers that Horatio has feelings for Ophelia, he feigns an attraction to Ophelia to break up any relationship between her and Horatio.

The staging of “The Murder of Gonzago” and the death of Polonius follow as traditional.  In a difference, though, Claudius sends Hamlet to Norway to be put to death by Fortinbras.  Hamlet intercepts and rewrites the order and has his two unnamed followers put to death.  In a scene that elicited a collective laugh from the audience, we see Fortinbras read the revised order and look to Hamlet for clarification.  Hamlet throws his arms up and shrugs, and the two followers are sent to the scaffold.

Hamlet returns to Elsinore and joins Claudius in a drunken revel.  He encourages Claudius to drink until he passes out and then sets fire to the chamber, killing Claudius.  Meanwhile, Laertes has returned to mourn the death of Ophelia.  Gertrude seeks revenge on Hamlet and enlists Laertes for the murder plot which is entirely her own invention.  Hamlet and Laertes duel, and Gertrude poisons a cup for Hamlet.  During the action, however, she inadvertently drinks from the poisoned cup and dies.  Laertes stabs Hamlet, killing him while seemingly escaping death himself.  As Horatio is caressing the torso of the now-deceased Hamlet, he discovers the secret and realizes why it is that he had such feelings for Hamlet.  Fortinbras enters on cue to take the Danish throne.

This is definitely the most bizarre version of Hamlet that I have seen.  Whereas Zeffirelli's version (see 9/14/14 post) was "adapted from" Shakespeare, this one could have been advertised as "inspired by" the original.  If you have the opportunity to find and view this one, its oddity makes it worth the time.

Back to the Fringe (Part III)

The third Hamlet event of the 2014 Rochester Fringe Festival was the most complete rendition of the lot.  Produced by the Shakespeare Company of Greater Rochester and entitled Shakespeare's Greatest Hits, its stately purpose was to...  Well, I'll let the festival guide describe it.

"In the whole of the Shakespeare canon, two plays stand above the rest as the epitome of what makes Shakespeare entertaining, insightful and engaging: the gripping drama of HAMLET, and the doomed romance of ROMEO AND JULIET. See five brave souls portray every character (yes, every character) in every scene (yes, every scene) of these two great plays that play great together!  And all in about an hour…"

The stage at MuCCC was set for an interesting evening of drama. Not that there was much to set on that stage.  There was a backdrop screen to create a backstage area and a shin-high barricade to simulate a freshly-dug grave behind it.  The rest of the props were carried in and out by the five players.

As I discovered, the version of Hamlet presented here was akin to The Fifteen-Minute Hamlet previously described (see 2/9/14 post).  The pace was quick, as one might expect with the time constraint.  Cast members flew in and out of scene, veritably running from backstage to front stage.  As a result, costumes--bedsheets, hair extensions, beards--were sometimes not entirely in place.

One of the oddest parts of the performance was the script.  Regardless of props, each cast member carried a copy of the script.  The performance was basically a dramatic reading performed while running around stage.  I'm unsure if that was a sign that this production was thrown together quickly and without regard for memorization or if the reading is an intentional part of the play's kitschy charm.  It was off-putting at first, but after a while I had grown used to it.

There were several other interesting facets.  Only one of the Rosencrantz and Guildenstern duo appeared in a speaking role.  The other was a suit of clothes, carried on and offstage on a clothes hanger by the speaking member of the pair.  The play-within-a-play was performed by sock puppets, and Hamlet's father (the white sock) was offed rather violently by Claudius (the black sock).  The arras that hid Polonius was a bedsheet thrown hastily over his head and shoulder.  The duel ended when Hamlet and Laertes bled "on both sides," although no swords changed hands and no blows were ever struck.  Claudius did not have a chance to drink from the poisoned cup before he was stabbed to death.

In 24 minutes, it was all over.  Mission accomplished.  The entire play was compacted into less than a half hour.  Romeo and Juliet, equally amusing and equally brief, followed.  Then we were shooed from the theatre so it could be cleared for another play, slated to begin ten minutes later.  As dramatic evenings in general and Hamlet in particular go, this one was indeed wondrous strange.

Back to the Fringe (Part II)

A second offering at the Rochester Fringe Festival included a bit of Hamlet.  The title of the production was "Merely Players."  The festival program described the show thus.

“All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players…”  Join us in exploring the complex relationships among iconic Shakespearean men and women through mask work, pantomime, scene work and puppetry.

It was unclear who "us" was; there was no playbill introducing the cast or the production company.  Even the accompanying photo in the festival program, reproduced below, left much unanswered.  All members of the six-person cast wore black, and the one major prop as such was a chair that was used for a few of the scenes.  Each scene save one was introduced by two members of the cast, who described the portrayal of the man and woman we were about to see.

Among the repertoire was Act III, Scene iv of Hamlet.  It was an adapted version of the bedroom scene between Hamlet and Gertrude.  For a show investigating the relationship between the sexes, this scene fit very well.  It was edited so that it included only Hamlet and Gertrude; Polonius and the ghost of Hamlet's father were mentioned but did not appear.

The scene was staged in a decidedly offbeat fashion.  The dialogue was fed through the sound system from offstage, perhaps a pre-recorded reading by two members of the cast.  The "action" onstage involved two puppets.  Basically they were masks attached to pieces of fabric.  Three cast members worked each puppet:  one for each hand and one for the body/head.  It was a strange presentation.  The cast did their best to make the puppets display the emotion of the scene, but the unchanging expressions of the masks worked against them.

Overall, this had to be one of the oddest additions to the Hamlet collection.  It was definitely a "Huh?" moment, suitable for a quick viewing and a quick recap for the blog.