Luvvie alert: Alex Lanipekun starred in my play ‘Eyes Catch Fire’ at the Finborough theatre. That was way before he went to RADA and become a big star of stage and screen (he was in ‘Spooks’ you know!) so I like to think I played some very small part in his well-deserved success. So read into that what you will.
What is there left to say about ‘Hamlet?’ Constantly staged by theatres both professional and amateur, endlessly studied in schools and universities, quoted to the point where one would be excused for thinking Shakespeare cobbled together the entire text from popular expressions (as opposed to inventing most of them)…how does a company make such a familiar play seem fresh and new?
One possibility, explored by National Theatre Artistic Director Nicholas Hytner in his current production, is to let the text do the work for you. The result is a clean, unfussy, and coherent ‘Hamlet’ that makes up for diminished passion and flair by allowing the Bard’s words to take centre stage.
Rory Kinnear plays the titular Danish prince and it is clear from the outset that his Hamlet is a cool and calculating realist. Perhaps channeling the spirit of disgruntled post-graduates unable to find work in recent years, Kinnear’s Hamlet is a bored intellectual whose tragedy stems from over-thinking his vengeance. He may don the famous hoodie in one scene, but this Prince is no yobbish tearaway. Like the thousands of students in Trafalgar square on the day I saw the play, Hamlet here is frustrated and angry that the future promised him has been erased and replaced only with uncertainty.
Textual clarity sheds light on other elements of the play, too. I’ve seen some productions that draw visual attention to the sheer amount of spying going on in Elsinor (in particular a CCTV-strewn RSC one starring Sam West) but here the words do the work and it’s altogether more sinister. In fact, I thought the black-suited heavies resembling secret service agents with their wrist walkie-talkies were unnecessary. Between Polonius (David Calder), Claudius (Patrick Malahide), Hamlet, Rosencrantz (Ferdinand Kingsley), Guildenstern (Prasanna Puwanarajah), Ophelia (Ruth Negga) – hell, just about everyone in the play – you have enough explicit entreaties to spy on and deceive other characters to understand just how rotten the Danish state is.
Commitment to Shakespeare’s words has some unexpected drawbacks as well, most notably in what is, to my mind, a diminishing of the female roles (that is to say Gertrude and Ophelia, the only two significant female characters in the play…which probably tells you something right there). Forget any Oedipal interpretations of Hamlet’s relationship with his mother; there’s not even a bed in the famous scene in her chambers. Gertrude (Clare Higgins) is devoid of any passion and is instead featured here with a drink permanently in hand. From her ever-smiling, slightly wobbily demeanor you’d be excused for thinking she needed all those drinks to keep downing the mood stabilisers.
The set and costume design have a monochrome palate straight out of the All Saints winter collection and with The XX providing the soundtrack to one scene and a rather exciting sword fight between Kinnear and Alex Lanipekun’s Laertes in the final scene, there are some concessions to the student groups which will no doubt be obliged to see the production for their GCSE English course. Whether or not this will make up for the 3.5 hour running time is another question. Sure, the young people who were in attendance when I saw Hamlet were getting a faithful rendering of what is arguable Shakespeare’s most famous play. But without some more passion, more pizazz will they appreciate it if they’ve fallen asleep?
So, the verdict. Hytner and Kinnear’s Hamlet is a good (not great) production that brings the language to the fore and reminds us why our culture has a love/hate relationship with Shakespeare: words, words, words.
Tags: Alex Lanipekun, David Calder, Ferdinand Kingsley, Hamlet, National Theatre, Nicholas Hytner, Patrick Malahide, Prasanna Puwanarajah, Rory Kinnear, Ruth Negga
