'Hamlet' Driven by Strong Performances

The idea that the various characters who surround Hamlet serve primarily to illuminate aspects of his own character is not a novel proposition. Unlike other theories of the play, such as, say, its Freudian or feminist interpretations, this concept pertains far more directly to “Hamlet” as text than to “Hamlet” as theater, and it rarely manifests in performance. It was decidedly ambitious, then, for director Lelaina E. Vogel ’15 to cast a “Hamlet” without Hamlet, a version of the play in which the protagonist’s lines were dispersed among the other actors, who changed into black costumes to identify themselves as the current Prince of Denmark. Fortunately, the theory on which Vogel bases her direction was a valuable one, a compelling idea that, when performed, cast a familiar play in a novel and intriguing light. Despite some missteps in the execution of this fundamental inspiration, stellar acting and a unique premise worked together to create a show that was more than worthwhile.

Vogel’s “Hamlet,” which ran April 3-11 on the Loeb Mainstage, certainly took a risk. It divested the play of its core virtue: the character of Hamlet himself. In doing so, however, Vogel dispersed those affecting elements of Hamlet’s character among the play’s other characters, making them far more developed and intriguing in the process. Emilie G.C. Thompson ’16, an inactive Arts editor who plays Gertrude for the majority of the play, delivered the soliloquy wherein Hamlet condemned his mother and wished that his religious views permitted him to take his own life. The idea that Gertrude herself might have asserted, “Frailty, thy name is woman!” provided depth to an oft-neglected character. Similarly, the choice to have Horatio (Matthew B. Barrieau ’16) perform the “To be or not to be” soliloquy illuminated his profound sadness in the wake of Hamlet’s death. At other points, this reapportioning of Hamlet’s lines gave insight into Hamlet himself. In one of the performance’s most clever moments, Gertrude and Laertes (Matt J. Ciommo ’15) fought for the role of Hamlet while performing “O what a rogue and peasant slave am I,” a directorial choice that created an affecting manifestation of the self-hatred that characterized the soliloquy.

Unfortunately, the enormous potential of the performance’s premise went unused more often than not. Frequently, the assignment of Hamlet to one actor or another seemed made for reasons of logistics—for example, Laertes, quite an obvious foil for Hamlet, spoke the balance of Hamlet’s lines simply because he was away in France for the majority of the play. After Ophelia (Juliana N. Sass ’17) died, she took on Hamlet’s role for the show’s remainder. Such choices seemed lazy rather than thought out, and they thus made poor use of the opportunity to develop the play’s secondary characters. Claudius (Anthony Amoroso), for example, rarely played Hamlet, though granting him the role for the pivotal scene in Gertrude’s bedroom could have deepened his character substantially.

Ultimately, however, the show’s spectacular cast lessened the prominence of these missteps and brought its virtues into greater relief. Even though Claudius gained little from the performance’s premise, Amoroso’s portrayal of him was so pitch perfect that he was nevertheless an effective character. Though Laertes had more than his fair share of Hamlet’s lines, he never quite overstayed his welcome thanks to Ciommo’s masterful delivery of Hamlet’s lies of feigned madness. And, though Ophelia was only given the chance to become Hamlet postmortem, Sass’s nuanced and eminently believable acting ensured that she was compelling before her death.

Perhaps, then, despite the novelty of the show’s premise, its success was based on elements it might have shared with any other production. Certainly, the trappings and accoutrements of a show are significant, but, in the case of “Hamlet,” it was the cast who ultimately made the performance.