Hamlet

Review By: Carey Purcell
CareyPurcell@TheCinemaSource.com

“Frailty, thy name is woman”

Not in this Hamlet.

Irony exists on several levels in Shakespeare’s tragedy, currently in performances in the Delacorte Theatre in Central Park. There’s the situational irony of the audience knowing what the characters don’t know, there’s the dramatic irony of Hamlet knowing what other character’s don’t know, and then there’s the slightly delightful irony of this critic knowing that in a show which speaks so poorly of women, the two principal females are the strongest members of the cast.

The tragedy of Hamlet is a familiar one to anyone who has taken English class in high school. The Prince of Denmark is told by the ghost of his father that his uncle Claudius murdered his father, the king, and then married the widowed queen less than two months later. In attempting to discover the truth and avenge the murder, Hamlet pretends to be insane. The pretending quickly disappears into actual insanity, resulting in numerous deaths, including Hamlet’s own.

While the story is a familiar one that is revisited frequently, due no doubt to its great dramatic potential, it can never truly be dull – that is, if the cast gives the characters enough investment and depth to make them actual people worth caring about for 3+ hours, instead of echoes of past Shakespeare performances. Sadly, this cast fails to accomplish that.

Cast in the title role Michael Stuhlbarg does shockingly little with what may be one of the greatest and most challenging roles in all of Shakespeare’s creation. His Hamlet is sulky, silent and, to quote another audience member, sniveling. The fury that propels the great lengths that Hamlet goes to is missing. When Hamlet should be fuming, he is fumbling. When he should be roaring with rage, he is sulking in the corner. This rage seems to be found instead in Horatio, played by Kevin Carroll, who is supposed to function as the voice of reason amidst the chaos in Denmark. Hamlet’s best friend, who witnesses all of the Prince’s mistakes and miscalculations, commenting calmly on them from a distance, is an awkward, misshapen character who doesn’t seem to know where he really stands on things. In the opening scenes, when the ghost appears to the men, Horatio yells more than Hamlet – and even that isn’t very much.

The same can be said of King Claudius (Andre Braugher) and Laertes (David Harbour). Both men possess energy that is tangible in the audience, but this energy is misdirected and bounces about the stage without settling on any true focus. Sam Waterson’s Polonius possesses more single-mindedness in his role, when he is not struggling to remember his lines, which he did several times at last Thursday’s performance.

The cast finds its saving grace in Lauren Ambrose’s Ophelia. Ambrose, whom this critic had the pleasure of seeing play Juliet last summer, possesses an almost unearthly ease with the language of Shakespeare, reciting her lines glibly and gracefully while also developing Ophelia ...