Early in Robert Hastie’s new production of Hamlet, its identity crisis comes into focus. We begin in darkness, with palace guards Barnardo and Francisco’s opposing torches offering mere glimpses of the Lyttelton stage. It’s a stylish opening which relies heavily on physicality to conjure the King’s (Ryan Ellsworth) Phantom, culminating in a wide-eyed, silent scream that recalls the specific, visceral horror of Japanese cinema. It is an arresting, atmospheric start that promises a psychological nightmare.
But as the eerie string soundtrack swells to raise the lights on the fateful wedding, we are transported not to a ghost story, but to a costume comedy drama. It’s a beautiful production to look at, the period dress lavish, if nothing we haven’t seen before: the military attire of the ruling males suggesting modern aristocrats arrayed with unearned medals and regalia.
The dialogue has a witty sparkle which keeps the audience tittering, but it sets the stage for a production that, over two hours and forty minutes, attempts to straddle a traditional and a hyper-modern approach to the text. It wrestles with comedy and tragedy, only to end up falling between these many stools.
Hiran Abeysekera’s Messy, Modern Hamlet
At the centre of this tonal wrestle is Hiran Abeysekera as the Prince of Denmark. It is a messy Hamlet in many ways, both in his emo-ish 20th-century sensibilities and conception. Clad initially in a drab, dishevelled black suit, Abeysekera later sports painted nails and a Blockbuster Video sweatshirt. Is he a quasi-goth? A student layabout? Whatever the case, he seems more a confused, rebellious youth than a conflicted prince capable of sophistry and murder.
At the centre of this tonal wrestle is Hiran Abeysekera as the Prince of Denmark. It is a messy Hamlet in many ways, both in his emo-ish 20th-century sensibilities and conception.
Vocally, Abeysekera is also a little thin for the text, and at times, I found myself wondering if he was channelling a young Prince Charles. He manifests a sort of petulant, unpredictable madness quite well, offering a believable, increasingly odious brat prone to apparently chaotic tantrums. However, his impish humour and faux-derangement ring truer than the immature grief he brings to his opening scenes. This creates a friction in the tragedy: it is difficult to feel huge sympathy for such a peevish figure as the bodies pile up. “To Be or Not To Be” is handled well enough, but it lacks particular weight or beauty—a symptom of a protagonist who regularly feels less like a tragic hero and more like a nuisance.
A Clash of Styles: The Supporting Cast
Compounding matters, the world around him is populated by figures who seem to belong to different plays. Alistair Petrie’s Claudius is excellent, a charming politician with sufficient charisma to hide his dark secrets—he anchors the political thriller aspect of the play. Conversely, Geoffrey Streatfeild’s Polonius is a well-intentioned buffoon. Indeed, he makes the “never a borrower or a lender be” chap so likeable that his murder feels particularly egregious, shifting the audience’s favour further away from the Prince who (accidentally) slays him.
We see this disconnect clearly in the younger generation, too. Rosencrantz (Hari Mackinnon) and Guildenstern (Joe Bolland) are played as nice-but-dim Hooray Henries who vibe well with this version of Hamlet, but this comedy of manners sits awkwardly against other elements, such as the earnest thespian sensibility of Siobhán Redmond’s First Player. Her passionately delivered Pyrrhus’ speech, central to the plot and to prompting Hamlet into drastic action, feels out of place, especially when followed by a Murder of Gonzago (The Mousetrap) that is staged as a modern, almost slam-poetry reading complete with propulsive beats. While the microphones help to augment the play’s innate feeling of a court under scrutiny, this thematic confusion overtakes the political interpersonal tension, leaving us with spectacle, goo, and even chuckles, but little suspense.
Visual Metaphors and Saving Graces
An utterly impressive Francesca Mills, however, may be the production’s saving grace. Her Ophelia offers lovely, cheeky chat in the beginning, establishing a lively modern family dynamic with her dad, Polonius, and Tom Glenister’s more staid brother, Laertes. It makes her eventual unravelling all the more painful. Her arc retains the emotional weight missing from the ill-fated Hamlet’s accelerating journey into mass destruction.
Ryan Ellsworth also deserves mention for doing heavy lifting in the dramaturgy department, playing the Ghost, the Player King, and the Gravedigger. It is a clever touch—implying that death wears the same face throughout Hamlet’s life. Similarly effective is the decision to have multiple members of the cast don fencing whites throughout the play; it frames swordplay as a commonplace part of court life, making the final, fateful bout (gorgeously choreographed by Kate Waters) less remarkable and all the more visceral.
An utterly impressive Francesca Mills, however, may be the production’s saving grace.
Some praise is also due to Ben Stones for the perpetually gorgeous design of both set and costuming – when I call this Hamlet lavish, I mean it.
NT Live Broadcast and Final Verdict
However, the camera work for this broadcast, while serviceable, takes little advantage of the lens and its possibilities. The mix of stage-wide shots and close-ups certainly brings the viewer closer to the action than those in the front rows, but that’s about it.
By the time we reach the assured ending, with the ghosts of the day’s many victims looking on, the emotional impact is muted. Tessa Wong’s gender-flipped Horatio may break her heart in style, but with Hamlet having spent much of the runtime as a rather annoying twit railing against characters plucked from a period romp, the tragedy feels distant.
So whilst Hastie’s Hamlet is not in a rush, offering a lavish, well-paced, coherent narrative arc, it is imbalanced by its own theatrical ambitions. It is a production that tries to be everything at once—classic, cool, funny, and horrific—and in doing so, forgets to be moving.
Featured Image: Hiran Abeysekera (Hamlet) in Hamlet at the National Theatre. (c) Sam Taylor
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