Well, it was a very good Hamlet. Patrick Stewart was wonderful, of course, and so was David Tennant, the Hamlet, whom Sarah tells me plays Doctor Who. A bit of a departure for him, then.
I have a few little quibbles...all we Shakespearean types just love to find something annoying in ANY production that we can chew over.
My major quibble with this production was the weather. Now, it is winter, and very cold...clearly stated in Act 1, Scene 1. And much later on, when Hamlet escapes from the boat (although this being modern dress, it seemed to be an airplane - you heard machine-ish noises but didn't see it) taking him to England, he ends up in a snow covered landscape. This being the case, why did the director choose to show his madness earlier by making him run around barefoot? This is a castle, in Denmark, in winter. And you saw not a single fireplace in any scene, and frankly, I don't care how modern your dress is...castles of ANY period just aren't all that warm (high rise penthouses and Soho lofts have the same problem, I hear...something to do with heat diffusion in large high ceilinged spaces). And along the same lines, why was Ophelia running around in little sleeveless dresses, without a cardigan or anything? This also made a complete mockery of Gertrude's speech about her drowning, because Ophelia had just finished her mad scene, which she performed in her slip. That makes Gertrude's remarks total nonsense...they're something on the lines of "Awhile her garments bore her up, but then, heavy with their drink..." etc., etc. I played Gertrude, whom I found a distinctly boring broad and NEVER liked, so unusually for me, I've suppressed most of her lines. If you want all of Taming of the Shrew, I'm your gal...I LOVED playing Kate. Anyway, as I was saying, a thin slip, bra and panties are not going to bear her up in the water, nor are they going to cause her to sink, since the outfit weighed just about as much as a one piece bathing suit. And what was she doing farting around by the water in her underwear in winter? Yeah, yeah, she's nuts. OK. I get it.
However, on the whole, the production was fast paced and very, VERY well acted and I enjoyed the hell out of it.
By the by, I must apologize for two entries running in which I ran on about my birdcage notion. Put it down to (currently) frustrated interior decoration skills.
Meanwhile, I'm NOT working tomorrow or Friday...they changed the shooting dates; I think it might be the wind. Almost all of us, men and women, are wearing straw hats, and when there's the slightest bit of wind up on the Boardwalk, they start flying and everybody has to regroup and reshoot. But they texted me for two MORE days! So now I've got this coming Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and the Monday after that! Yahoo!
And more people coming in and out of the house...had some today and more tomorrow. My birdcage is getting closer all the time...
Love, Wendy
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