Best Hamlet ever.
I mean, he's not "my Hamlet", not wholly. If I could act, and the stage was mine, then my Hamlet would be ruthlessly intelligent, incisive, cruel, a scholar out of his depth in events he couldn't rationalise, and always, the only person laughing at his own jokes. And also, a pretty, gangly indie-boy of some sort. I'm not sure Rory Kinnear would obviously tick any of those boxes - he doesn't even find his jokes funny - and perhaps that's indicative of the differences between how Hamlet is percieved as a character, and how he is on the page.
I've just been to the National Theatre, within spitting-distance of the stage, and am about to give a nauseatingly positive review. I'm also about to try and defend that statement above, which wasn't true until I started writing, and discovered it absolutley was.
Often in Hamlet, an individual scene will fail because it just doesn't gel with the actor's interpretation. They'll be subtle, upset, cold - the early scenes offer an almost unlimited range. Unfortunately, that's not true of the second act, so you'll get them suddenly ramping up to 200MPH because the script seems to demand anger - the nunnery, the closet, and the crocodile scenes particularly. It seems jarring and forced in comparison to what has come before.
The graveside most of all: Hamlet has just come back from England in disguise and stumbled on Ophelia's funeral. He abandons his secrecy to pick a fight with Laertes, her brother, because he's pissed off that Laertes is sad. It's inconsiderate - of course Laertes is unhappy that his sister is dead. It's unmotivated - who exactly is he angry at here? It doesn't necessarily tally with the information we've been given - like, no other evidence at all that he cares for Ophelia at all. It's unforgiveably rude - Hamlet has killed Laertes' father, and also been the two chief factors in Ophelia's death. Plus, it's a weird scene which involves the two leads leaping into a grave and playing tug-o-war over a body, with one of them claiming he could eat a crocodile like it's the biggest boast of manliness instead of just a bizzare mental image.
In short, it always makes Hamlet look like a shit and it always comes off as out of character and weird. And that's the problem with gangly indie-boys - unless that's already a note in their character, they seem out of it. Not Kinnear. He's just so unhappy and angry, pain and supressed rage all the way through, that for the first time ever, this scene hasn't seemed terrible in every way. Instead, Laertes just becomes a cathexis for his misdirected rage, just as Polonius, Ophelia and Gertrude have in those other awkward scenes. And they all work so well because those other, early scenes in which others have depicted him struggling to cope merely with despair, he was trying to find a way to bear his anger. Indeed, I'd go as far as to say that the soliloquies were for once the weak spots, compared to how wonderful the ensemble scenes were. Even "oh, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!", where it is textual fact that Hamlet flies into a rage at himself, and then is ashamed of his inability to control his emotions, too often comes off as the exception (I'm suddenly ANGRY! And now normal service has been resumed) instead of the rule (I'M ANGRY I'M ANGRY, AND SUDDENLY I'M SO ANGRY I CAN'T COPE AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA CALM - I'M JUST ANGRY).
This doesn't make it in any way one-note, I mean this is a properly awesome and subtle rage that works alongside the character's melancholy, and intelligence, and humour, but that also works textually without having to jettison anything as part of a perfect character. And that makes the show as a whole more downbeat, because you are never in any doubt of just how much pain he is in. He has the most wonderful fake smile that's almost worse: the humour is properly humourless. A few people tried laughing at the gravediggers' scene, but only because they thought they should.
It's also the first time in some time I've seen a properly cracky Hamlet, and this also works. I like subtle Hamlets, but it's always too obvious that they are calculating and sane - the jokes too funny, the audience too in cahoots in comparison with the oblivious fellow characters. Many Hamlets are just too civilised to "go full retard"; and also, to be properly evil. I rarely believe it when he coldly sends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern off to their deaths, but this production in particular he's unreasonable enough that I understand why it would seem reasonable.
With all that seething anger, you'd wonder how he managed to stretch revenge out to 3-hours-30, so it's time to introduce this production's other ace: the design. Aaaah, beautiful - almost chronologically, I've seen more and more emphasis put on the paranoia of Elsinore, and this is the best I've ever seen. A band of suited security men haunt the stage; in the background during soliloquies, hanging about when Hamlet is trying to talk plans with friends. He is constantly being watched, guarded or followed, and the same is true of the Ophelia and everyone else. The stark sets were topped off with CCTV cameras. The oft-cut scene where Polonius engages Reynaldo to go to France and spy on his son seemed suddenly at home in this horrific context. It's clearly impossible for Hamlet to get anywhere near Claudius.
In fact, this production seems to have addressed my usual quibbles with an almost terrifying accuracy. In the second act, they pack Hamlet off stage for about eight scenes. He's such a driving force, and the scenes he's absent for are so...unspecial, that I never really enjoy Act II as much. Laertes returns and shouts, Ophelia spends two awful scenes going mad, Gertrude delivers an overly-famous speech which always seems forced, and then there's the crocodile scene.
It zipped by! That was helped by the most perfect, wonderful Laertes - a character who too often defaults to "prat", and is then an irritating companion the entire time our hero is out of the way. I can't put my finger on what was so special about this one. Perhaps because Hamlet was so angry, Laertes couldn't be, I don't know. He came across as very sincere, properly sympathetic - a nice, straightforward guy who's completely gullible. A perfect Laertes went some way towards diminishing my Act II boredom.
The same can almost be said of Ophelia, almost. She was one of the best I have ever seen - not sanctimonious, and realistically cowed into misery by the oppressive castle atmosphere. I am now entirely convinced, however, that Ophelia is unplayable and the weakest element of an otherwise watertight play. She has no development, she's very difficult for any sane feminist to approach and totally lacks psychological realism. The relationship between her and Hamlet is a textual black hole, and we have to believe she goes properly nuts just because all her male authority figures have been taken away.
One of the remarkeable things about Shakespeare is how sophisticated and universal his writing is. His dialogue actually contains psychological depth, centuries before the actor's method was invented. Ophelia is a big exception to this: the pathos of the virgin maid singing bawdy pastorals is a 16th century sort of understanding of the human brain. When Hamlet explains:
Which is why I'm kinda glad they neutralised the stomach-turning description of the world's most beautiful suicide by having Ophelia secretly dragged off by security guards, and Gertrude aware that Claudius arranged to have her done away with. It was fun to see Claudius played as a downright villain again - I like him sympathetic, but this was a nice change. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern too where pretty nasty pieces of work - this too made sense in context. Gertrude was the modern performance you recognise of a frazzled career woman clutching a red wine - very good. I particularly enjoyed the closet scene - she becomes hysterical at the moment Polonius is killed and remains so for that reason because that's what murders to do people. It's so easy for the actors to forget the corpse...and I now think, in contrast with Ophelia, Polonius is impossible to play badly, perhaps because it's always the most experienced actor on stage taking on a pretty easy role. Downsides? Horatio. Wasn't special, and delivered the lines as if they were Sha-hakes-speah, but you can't win them all.
Onto the specifics: the ghost scenes are just splended! Very creepy - the actor sounded like he had reverb or something, but I knew he didn't. And spoke very quietly, but seemed to boom at the same time - most special. Hamlet's small shadow, as he slumped at the corner of the stage, dwarfed by his father's huge one. Hamlet just crying, as well you might, while the Ghost explained the circumstances of his death. And actually, every time the Ghost walked across stage, and you could see him there white against the darkness, before the lights acknowledged he was there: creepy! I've already mentioned Ophelia's unusual death; I also enjoyed the opening scene with her family, which got the level of tenderness just right - her laugh at Laertes' awkward chastity speech, Polonius pausing uncomfortably as he extols the virtues of truth. And I loved Hamlet discovering a mike hidden inside her book, and dictating to it. The closet scene featured Gertrude able to see the ghost, but lying about it: what a wonderful choice!
In fact, there's only one bad thing about this one, and that's a pretty crass attempt to sell T-shirts half way through. But let's not think about that.
Instead, let's focus on the fact that I may just have seen a perfect Hamlet. So many of my quibbles were addressed, and the tedium of the second half almost totally evaporated. Any criticism I could have left should be aimed at the play itself. Which I've fallen in love with, all over again, with a funny feeling that Mr Kinnear has just fundamentally altered the way I see it...
I mean, he's not "my Hamlet", not wholly. If I could act, and the stage was mine, then my Hamlet would be ruthlessly intelligent, incisive, cruel, a scholar out of his depth in events he couldn't rationalise, and always, the only person laughing at his own jokes. And also, a pretty, gangly indie-boy of some sort. I'm not sure Rory Kinnear would obviously tick any of those boxes - he doesn't even find his jokes funny - and perhaps that's indicative of the differences between how Hamlet is percieved as a character, and how he is on the page.
I've just been to the National Theatre, within spitting-distance of the stage, and am about to give a nauseatingly positive review. I'm also about to try and defend that statement above, which wasn't true until I started writing, and discovered it absolutley was.
Often in Hamlet, an individual scene will fail because it just doesn't gel with the actor's interpretation. They'll be subtle, upset, cold - the early scenes offer an almost unlimited range. Unfortunately, that's not true of the second act, so you'll get them suddenly ramping up to 200MPH because the script seems to demand anger - the nunnery, the closet, and the crocodile scenes particularly. It seems jarring and forced in comparison to what has come before.
The graveside most of all: Hamlet has just come back from England in disguise and stumbled on Ophelia's funeral. He abandons his secrecy to pick a fight with Laertes, her brother, because he's pissed off that Laertes is sad. It's inconsiderate - of course Laertes is unhappy that his sister is dead. It's unmotivated - who exactly is he angry at here? It doesn't necessarily tally with the information we've been given - like, no other evidence at all that he cares for Ophelia at all. It's unforgiveably rude - Hamlet has killed Laertes' father, and also been the two chief factors in Ophelia's death. Plus, it's a weird scene which involves the two leads leaping into a grave and playing tug-o-war over a body, with one of them claiming he could eat a crocodile like it's the biggest boast of manliness instead of just a bizzare mental image.
In short, it always makes Hamlet look like a shit and it always comes off as out of character and weird. And that's the problem with gangly indie-boys - unless that's already a note in their character, they seem out of it. Not Kinnear. He's just so unhappy and angry, pain and supressed rage all the way through, that for the first time ever, this scene hasn't seemed terrible in every way. Instead, Laertes just becomes a cathexis for his misdirected rage, just as Polonius, Ophelia and Gertrude have in those other awkward scenes. And they all work so well because those other, early scenes in which others have depicted him struggling to cope merely with despair, he was trying to find a way to bear his anger. Indeed, I'd go as far as to say that the soliloquies were for once the weak spots, compared to how wonderful the ensemble scenes were. Even "oh, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!", where it is textual fact that Hamlet flies into a rage at himself, and then is ashamed of his inability to control his emotions, too often comes off as the exception (I'm suddenly ANGRY! And now normal service has been resumed) instead of the rule (I'M ANGRY I'M ANGRY, AND SUDDENLY I'M SO ANGRY I CAN'T COPE AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA CALM - I'M JUST ANGRY).
This doesn't make it in any way one-note, I mean this is a properly awesome and subtle rage that works alongside the character's melancholy, and intelligence, and humour, but that also works textually without having to jettison anything as part of a perfect character. And that makes the show as a whole more downbeat, because you are never in any doubt of just how much pain he is in. He has the most wonderful fake smile that's almost worse: the humour is properly humourless. A few people tried laughing at the gravediggers' scene, but only because they thought they should.
It's also the first time in some time I've seen a properly cracky Hamlet, and this also works. I like subtle Hamlets, but it's always too obvious that they are calculating and sane - the jokes too funny, the audience too in cahoots in comparison with the oblivious fellow characters. Many Hamlets are just too civilised to "go full retard"; and also, to be properly evil. I rarely believe it when he coldly sends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern off to their deaths, but this production in particular he's unreasonable enough that I understand why it would seem reasonable.
With all that seething anger, you'd wonder how he managed to stretch revenge out to 3-hours-30, so it's time to introduce this production's other ace: the design. Aaaah, beautiful - almost chronologically, I've seen more and more emphasis put on the paranoia of Elsinore, and this is the best I've ever seen. A band of suited security men haunt the stage; in the background during soliloquies, hanging about when Hamlet is trying to talk plans with friends. He is constantly being watched, guarded or followed, and the same is true of the Ophelia and everyone else. The stark sets were topped off with CCTV cameras. The oft-cut scene where Polonius engages Reynaldo to go to France and spy on his son seemed suddenly at home in this horrific context. It's clearly impossible for Hamlet to get anywhere near Claudius.
In fact, this production seems to have addressed my usual quibbles with an almost terrifying accuracy. In the second act, they pack Hamlet off stage for about eight scenes. He's such a driving force, and the scenes he's absent for are so...unspecial, that I never really enjoy Act II as much. Laertes returns and shouts, Ophelia spends two awful scenes going mad, Gertrude delivers an overly-famous speech which always seems forced, and then there's the crocodile scene.
It zipped by! That was helped by the most perfect, wonderful Laertes - a character who too often defaults to "prat", and is then an irritating companion the entire time our hero is out of the way. I can't put my finger on what was so special about this one. Perhaps because Hamlet was so angry, Laertes couldn't be, I don't know. He came across as very sincere, properly sympathetic - a nice, straightforward guy who's completely gullible. A perfect Laertes went some way towards diminishing my Act II boredom.
The same can almost be said of Ophelia, almost. She was one of the best I have ever seen - not sanctimonious, and realistically cowed into misery by the oppressive castle atmosphere. I am now entirely convinced, however, that Ophelia is unplayable and the weakest element of an otherwise watertight play. She has no development, she's very difficult for any sane feminist to approach and totally lacks psychological realism. The relationship between her and Hamlet is a textual black hole, and we have to believe she goes properly nuts just because all her male authority figures have been taken away.
One of the remarkeable things about Shakespeare is how sophisticated and universal his writing is. His dialogue actually contains psychological depth, centuries before the actor's method was invented. Ophelia is a big exception to this: the pathos of the virgin maid singing bawdy pastorals is a 16th century sort of understanding of the human brain. When Hamlet explains:
I have of late--but wherefore I know not--lost all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises; and indeed it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory, this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason! how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how express and admirable! in action how like an angel! in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust? man delights not me.I'm sure we've all had days like that. And it struck me now, more than ever, how perfect so many of Hamlet's descriptions of despair are. I've never seen someone express mental illness through tragic, accusing folk tunes before - the scenes are awkward to play because they're awkwardly written, and Ophelia is treated like some sort of reverent, knowing symbol of something throughout. No, the sound of a sweet voice singing is not enough to bring me to tears. Or move me. Or anything. "Here, have a metaphor!"
Which is why I'm kinda glad they neutralised the stomach-turning description of the world's most beautiful suicide by having Ophelia secretly dragged off by security guards, and Gertrude aware that Claudius arranged to have her done away with. It was fun to see Claudius played as a downright villain again - I like him sympathetic, but this was a nice change. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern too where pretty nasty pieces of work - this too made sense in context. Gertrude was the modern performance you recognise of a frazzled career woman clutching a red wine - very good. I particularly enjoyed the closet scene - she becomes hysterical at the moment Polonius is killed and remains so for that reason because that's what murders to do people. It's so easy for the actors to forget the corpse...and I now think, in contrast with Ophelia, Polonius is impossible to play badly, perhaps because it's always the most experienced actor on stage taking on a pretty easy role. Downsides? Horatio. Wasn't special, and delivered the lines as if they were Sha-hakes-speah, but you can't win them all.
Onto the specifics: the ghost scenes are just splended! Very creepy - the actor sounded like he had reverb or something, but I knew he didn't. And spoke very quietly, but seemed to boom at the same time - most special. Hamlet's small shadow, as he slumped at the corner of the stage, dwarfed by his father's huge one. Hamlet just crying, as well you might, while the Ghost explained the circumstances of his death. And actually, every time the Ghost walked across stage, and you could see him there white against the darkness, before the lights acknowledged he was there: creepy! I've already mentioned Ophelia's unusual death; I also enjoyed the opening scene with her family, which got the level of tenderness just right - her laugh at Laertes' awkward chastity speech, Polonius pausing uncomfortably as he extols the virtues of truth. And I loved Hamlet discovering a mike hidden inside her book, and dictating to it. The closet scene featured Gertrude able to see the ghost, but lying about it: what a wonderful choice!
In fact, there's only one bad thing about this one, and that's a pretty crass attempt to sell T-shirts half way through. But let's not think about that.
Instead, let's focus on the fact that I may just have seen a perfect Hamlet. So many of my quibbles were addressed, and the tedium of the second half almost totally evaporated. Any criticism I could have left should be aimed at the play itself. Which I've fallen in love with, all over again, with a funny feeling that Mr Kinnear has just fundamentally altered the way I see it...
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