Category: Hamlet

Hamlet endures due to its complex characters, psychological depth, and exploration of universal themes such as death, revenge, and the human condition. Its enduring popularity is also attributed to its poetic language, memorable quotes, and its influence on literature, film, and popular culture. Hamlet’s themes and characters continue to be studied and adapted in various forms, making it one of Shakespeare’s most famous and frequently performed plays. Its timeless appeal lies in its ability to speak to audiences across generations, cultures, and languages, and its place as a cornerstone of Western literature.

Browse the text of Hamlet entire play here.

Bet I Can Predict The Future

~ duane ~ 1 Comment
Which character was he supposed to be?

Finally, finally, my oldest gets to participate in a dedicated Shakespeare course this fall. I don’t have the title in front of me but it’s basically Shakespeare and Modern Film.  Given that my bestest online Shakespeare pal is a dude whose actual name is “Bard Film” I can’t wait until she gets homework.  (“Daddy, can I please do my own homework for once?”  “It’s ok sweetie, Bardfilm and I have got this.”)

Anyway, we had to order textbooks and I see they’ll be studying Othello, Taming of the Shrew and Twelfth Night. Folger editions, for the curious.

Hmmm.  Anybody else seeing a pattern there?

I’m calling it right now – I’m going to have my daughter watch O, 10 Things I Hate About You and She’s The Man before school starts because I’ll bet you anything that’s what they’ll be doing in class. I never thought I’d say this but I’m glad Hamlet’s not among her required texts. If they had her watching Lion King I don’t think I could stand it.

 

 

Shakespeare and Friends

~ duane ~ Leave a comment

I admit it, this post is a complete advertisement for my latest merchandise. I think I honestly do a pretty reasonable job of not spamming you folks every time I put up a new t-shirt design, don’t I?  So surely you won’t begrudge me a Friday afternoon commercial.

When I’m working at night, chances are Netflix is on in the background. I’m one of those folks that just likes the noise. I would love to churn through all the new original shows they’re making, but then I have to pay attention to what’s on, rather than letting it just drone in the background. So instead I turn to old series that I  know I like, that have a lot of episodes (that will auto play, you see).  You see where I’m going with this.

The entire ten season run of Friends has graced my television so often I think I’ve memorized all the episodes.  But it wasn’t until recently that the idea hit me … that opening font of theirs is absolutely iconic.  If you do “Skip Intro” you may never even notice it, but when you see it that classic scribble font with the little colored dots you’re definitely thinking, “I recognize that!”

Shakespeare and Friends

I wasn’t even sure Amazon would let these up, so I didn’t go crazy with the “Look! It’s Friends!” keywords.  But that doesn’t mean I can’t tell the real story here.  To get started I made a bunch of versions of Shakespeare’s most iconic characters – Hamlet, Macbeth, Othello, Romeo, Juliet, Mercutio. All are available in both t-shirt and hoodie. The t-shirts are available in men’s, women’s and youth sizes (the hoodies are unisex). All the images below are clickable, where you can see the colors available for each.

What do you think? Did I miss your favorite character?  What do you think looks better, character names or play names? For those first couple it doesn’t matter 🙂 but I soon ran out of 5-7 character single words. 🙂 Should I make Prospero and Malvolio and Viola and some other more lesser known characters?

Let me know your thoughts in the comments!

 

 

 

Your Favorite Hamlet

~ duane ~ 1 Comment
As far as I know, Sir Ian’s version is not available on video.

So at work the other day, my CEO asked which Hamlet was my favorite.  At the time, in context, I assumed that he meant film version, as in, something that other people could then go watch.  Not a live production that, if you missed it, telling somebody that it was your favorite didn’t serve much purpose because they couldn’t go take advantage of that information.

I decided to ask the question on Twitter.  I had no idea I’d get the kind of response.  Taking out the people who pretended not to understand the question (answering with the names of cozy little villages, or “Q1”, etc..), I still got over 20 different Hamlets to choose from.  Not all of them are available on video, but that’s been changing lately with live broadcasts of many.

For the record I’d not even heard several of these names, but was happy to discover them.  Some performances are even on YouTube in full!

One Vote

Papaa Essiedu (Royal Shakespeare Company, 2016)

Oscar Isaac (The Public Theatre, 2017)

Andrew Scott (Almeida Theatre, 2017)

Campbell Scott (2000)

Adrian Lester (2002 directed by Peter Brook)

Tom Hiddleston (2017, as directed by Kenneth Branagh)

Richard Chamberlain (Hallmark Hall of Fame, 1970)

Ruth Negga  (coming in late 2018)

Two Votes

Derek Jacobi (1980)

Mark Rylance (1989).

Coming in Second, with Four Votes

Kenneth Branagh (1996) comes in with 4 votes,

Our Winner, with Six Votes is …

David Tennant (RSC 2009)!

Did you get to vote?  Who is your pick?  For the record, I told me CEO Branagh was my choice because as I said I was limiting myself to film versions I thought he might have a chance of seeing if he wanted to. I wasn’t going to give it to Mel Gibson or Ethan Hawke, the other two that leaped immediately to mind.  At the time I didn’t even think of Tennant, but on reflection I think I’d still keep my choice as Branagh. I found Tennant’s a little too … hyper?  OCD?  Can’t remember the words I used at the time.  But then we start to get into a debate about whether we’re talking about the movie as a whole, or about the character.  It’s probably true that Tennant’s Hamlet character was better than Branagh’s, but I like Branagh’s movie better as a whole.

(No love for Kevin Kline (1990), I notice.  I wonder if people simply never saw it?)

 

Something Cool In Denmark

~ duane ~ 1 Comment

I have no idea what I’ve found here, but I thought it would be fun to get back to the roots of this blog by writing about cool Shakespeare things.  I give you “Something Cool in Denmark,” or, “The Hipster Hamlet,” starring Robert Goulet.

This was apparently from something called the Chrysler Festival in 1957.

My parents are old enough to perhaps remember this, but if it was some sort of one time event I doubt they will. I’ll ask in the morning and update the post if I find anything.

UPDATE : Asked them, and while they had no specific memory of the show, my dad dug up some links that I hadn’t found including this one to an episode guide of the short-lived show. Other than Robert Goulet I don’t know any of these names.

Apr 17, 1957 – Guests on the final program of the season are the Liberace brothers, comedian Herb Shriner, contralto Marian Anderson, baritone George London, Shirley Harmer, the Don Wright Chorus and the cast of the annual Toronto review, Spring Thaw. The Spring Thaw cast will present Something Cool In Denmark, a take-off on Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Taking part will be Bob Goulet as Hamlet, Peter Mews, Sheila Billing, Paul Kligman, Barbara Hamilton, Dave Broadfoot and others. The Oscar Peterson Trio, originally scheduled, will not appear.

What Would You Do With Twins?

~ duane ~ Leave a comment

The other day I saw a discussion about how you think a modern Hamlet’s ghost should be staged. My first thought was, “I was the ghost popping up randomly, in the audience, in a way that makes them think it’s impossible for that to be happening.”

My first thought was, “Hologram?” But I put that off as too expensive, but also because the evidence about what was to happen (such as a mini pedestal/stage where he’d appear) would ruin the effect.

Then I thought, “Just have multiple actors dressed as the ghost, so when one exits, another one can appear elsewhere.”  But if they don’t look identical, the effect isn’t the same.

Twins!  Comedy of Errors had twins.  Ok, fine, maybe Shakespeare didn’t actually have twins to work with (did he?)  I know that I’ve yet to see a Comedy of Errors with actual twins.

But that brings me to our question. What if you did have twins in your group? How would you use them?  On the drive in to work today I was thinking about the difference between doubling an actor (Theseus / Oberon anybody?) versus how you’d do it with twins.  If you never have them on stage at the same time there’s no point, so how would you change the staging to take advantage?

How about two Hamlets?  One that devolves slowly into madness (complete with costume change), while the other remains his normal self, silently watching the proceedings. Until at some crucial point late in the play the good Hamlet disappears. (I saw a high school production once with five Hamlets, all on stage at once, all delivering the lines.  It was weird.)

King Lear where Goneril and Regan are twins?  Not sure how much that really changes the story, but it strengthens the bond between them versus Cordelia, and later shows how big a deal it is when they split.

A Tempest where Ariel and Caliban are twins?  I saw a production once where they were handled like conjoined twins, and at the end Prospero separated them.

I’m clearly no director, but I know many of you are. What better ideas can you come up with?  Assume that you can have access to a set of twins of whatever type you need, young or old, male or female.