The Shakespeare Geek has asked yet another interesting question that got me thinking quite a bit. “What do you think Hamlet’s relationship was with his father?” and later says, “… I think much of Hamlet’s hesitation comes out of a fear to acknowledge his true feelings about his dad.” The following is mostly in response to the aforementioned post.

Whether or not Hamlet Sr. was a loving and affectionate father, it’s hard to say. Perhaps he was lacking some tenderness toward his son, but I have no doubt that Hamlet had the utmost respect for his father as a person and as a king.

Look at how Hamlet compares his father to Claudius:

So excellent a king, that was to this Hyperion to a satyr

That’s a huge comparison there. His dad is a sun-god and his uncle is a sex-mongering goat man. Hamlet’s comparison here illustrates that he has the most respect for his father and none at all for his uncle.

so loving to my mother That he might not beteem the winds of heaven Visit her face too roughly.

If King Hamlet wasn’t a tender father, he certainly was a very loving husband — at least in Hamlet’s eyes. These words describe the marriage as very caring, very gentle. Back to Hamlet’s relationship with his dad…

If [the ghost] assume my noble father’s person,

Noble isn’t just there because he was a king, or an extra word to fill the pentameter line. If Hamlet calls his dad noble, he thinks that of him in this case. I don’t think there is any irony here. I think you’re starting to get my point. Skipping ahead to the “closet scene,” look at how Hamlet describes his father in the picture he shows to Gertrude.

See what a grace was seated on this brow:
Hyperion’s curls, the front of Jove himself,
An eye like Mars, to threaten and command,
A station like the herald Mercury
New lighted on a heaven-kissing hill,
A combination and a form indeed,
Where every god did seem to set his seal
To give the world assurance of a man.
This was your husband.

And her current husband is nothing but “A slave that is not twentith part the tithe Of your precedent lord.” I’m quite convinced that Hamlet didn’t have a bad relationship with his father. Maybe he feared him some, but not because his was horribly distant or cruel, but because he was a powerful, stern, yet respectable man and king.

As for Hamlet’s hesitation because he’s working out his feelings for his father, I don’t agree. As you can see from what I’ve already said Hamlet is quite clear on how he feels about dear dad.

Hamlet - in his mind - isn’t so much hesitating as being careful. He needs to some time to show the court that he is mad so that he will not be thought of as a threat to the king. He then uses the players to be absolutely sure of Claudius’ guilt. Hamlet wants to be king after (”He that hath [...] Popp’d in between th’ election and my hopes”) and he can’t afford to be wrong about anything. So when Hamlet find Claudius praying, it is really the first time they have been alone together. No is his chance to kill him. But Hamlet doesn’t just want to kill him… he wants to send his uncle’s black soul to hell. The man must be punished, not just released from his Earthly body.

But then Hamlet mistakenly kills Polonius. After this he is sent off to England so his revenge is delayed again (”How all occasions do inform against me.”) But he realizes now that the only way to be revenged is to stop being so careful, and just DO IT.

O, from this time forth, My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth!

Hamlet gets back, gets in a fight with Laertes over Ophelia’s grave, and is challenged to a fencing match for “sport.” At this point it’s rather unclear what Hamlet’s plans are toward his uncle, but he’s only been back for a day it would seem. Ever respectful Hamlet’s plans are delayed until after the match. He’s not about to say no to the wishes of the king and his mother I suppose. Maybe he was planning on killing Claudius that night.

But Hamlet ends up mortally wounded, and his mother is poisoned. Laertes tells him “Thy mother’s pois’ned. I can no more—the King, the King’s to blame.” So Hamlet kills Claudius for killing his mother.

Hamlet isn’t procrastinating, and he’s not unsure of whether he should revenge based on his feeling for his father. He is instead trying to carefully plan (”thinking too precisely on th’ event”) so that he can be king after the treacherous, lecherous, kindless villain is sent to hell.

In King Lear, the sisters Goneril and Regan are often seen to be rather… evil. They do after all turn away their father from their houses. But each time I see it I’m a little bothered by the portrayal. It seems to me that they are resigned to be cruel from the start after they get their land from dear papa.

I’m interested in seeing the sisters plead with dear dad to come to his senses about how many knights he needs, not cruelly deny his demands. I’m always more interested in seeing someone fight for what they want from someone, especially a loved one. It’d be far more moving to see the sisters fight with their father to realize his folly until the point where he runs off into the stormy night… and then give him up as a lost cause. Not before. They might not be the best people, but they surely have some respect for their father as well as hope for his wits.

It seems to me that Lear’s daughters are not quite as wicked as we sometimes see them, but rather in Lear’s mind. Sure, they do some pretty crazy things later on, but that arises AFTER they give up on their father. Then their ambitions and jealousies can take hold of them.
Has anyone else seen productions on stage or screen of Lear with “evil” sisters? And have you seen it a different way? And reading the text alone how do you perceive their actions?

It’s time for some show and tell. I’m curious to hopefully find some new reading material…So who’s reading some good books right now?

Currently I’m working on a very interesting piece called The Shakespearean Dramaturg: A Theoretical and Practical Guide by Andrew James Hartley. He’s the resident Dramaturg at the Georgia Shakespeare Festival. There’s a lot of cool thoughts on editing scripts; working with directors, designers, actors; and lots about how to effectively serve the production rather than become “The Shakespeare Police.” I’ll post a write up after I’m finished.

Next on my list will be Think On My Words: Exploring Shakespeare’s Language by David Crystal, co-author of Shakespeare’s Words. I’m very excited to read that. I don’t know too much about it but I’m a fan of the author.

And after that I enter into the world of Shakespearean fiction novels for the first time. What’s on your reading list?

“The play as written is 4 1/2 to five hours long,”
“Depending on the staging, a full, uncut production of Hamlet can last four to five hours.”
“Uncut, Hamlet runs a good five hours”

Or does it?

Those few random statements I found in articles online are everywhere. Reviews, books, classroom lectures, essays, and in people’s mouths. Where does this number come from?

How many of the people who say this have seen an uncut Hamlet, I wonder. I must confess that I have not seen an uncut version ON STAGE, but here’s what I do know:

• Arkangel’s audio Hamlet, uncut, includes plenty of music between scenes, as well as before and after the play with credits, etc — 3 hours, 25 minutes
• BBC Hamlet, uncut, with Derek Jacobi — 3 hours, 30 minutes, including intro and end credits.
• Kenneth Branagh’s “complete” Hamlet - uncut, plenty of cinematic sequences between text, extra action, and feature film length opening and closing credits! — 4 hours and 2 minutes.

So how could an uncut production take five hours?

In general films move faster than theatre does. It’s quicker to show something than to say something. But the BBC complete works series is basically filmed versions of the stage play, just on a sound stage and not in front of an audience.

What about scene changes? If you have a different complicated and giant set for every scene, sure, you’ll probably add an hour with scene changes… but who’s gonna do that? With a well designed unit set with smaller bits and pieces brought on and off for locations it’s not too difficult to keep the action moving with minimal or no pauses.

How about when Hamlet was first performed? For starters, we don’t know which text was used when it was performed in Shakespeare’s day. The text from the First Quarto, Second Quarto, and First Folio are all of various lengths. The most “complete” Hamlet that you’ll see in most published editions today is around four thousand lines of text, and close in length to any of the three versions of the play that I mentioned above. And if that full text was used, it is speculated that plays were acted at a much brisker pace than they are today. Perhaps in the 18th century, with more theatrical technologies and the use of spectacle becoming popular, it is possible that there were different complicated giant sets for every location and an hour was added on… but that extra time has very little to do with any performing, or anything to do with the text itself.

I have a feeling that the 5 hours long myth is meant to “wow” the audience, and make them be thankful before the curtain rises that they will only be seeing an edited, 2 and a half hour version.

The Taming of the Shrew is a wonderful play that we theatre artists all love for the great characters, the comedy, the language…

But what about the “problem” of the audience? This play is one (of many) of Shakespeare’s works that has elements that just seems to rub we moderns the wrong way. Will spectators ever be able let that go and enjoy the play or will there constantly be a battle between an auditor’s conscience and the attempted justifications made in the director’s notes?

In a recent review of Baltimore Shakespeare Festival’s production, the critic states

There’s no getting around the misogyny at the core of William Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew. You can try to talk yourself out of it, as dramaturg Jen Plants does in her program notes … You can try to restore the usually discarded framing device in an attempt to pass the whole thing off as a drunken dream. You can even cast a real ball of fire … as Katharina, the shrew who must be tamed.
Nothing works.

Theatres will usually try to present productions that are relevant today, that speak to modern generations. Most audience members watching Shrew will know in the back of their mind that this play was written 400 years ago for a very different audience with different thoughts about, well, a lot of things. But how can you convincingly justify putting on the play as something relevant?

It’s impossible just shrug relevance away and say “It’s a good play,” or “because it’s Shakespeare!” I’m sure no matter what you say there will be people flocking to come see it if it’s well acted. But the parts of the play that are relevant today are for the director to find or create.

You may have noticed that I don’t really have an answer for you. I’m a little conflicted over it. I enjoy the play for a variety of reasons that I have mentioned: the characters, the comedy, the language. But if I were an artistic director of a theatre company getting my chosen season approved by the board of directors and was asked to justify my choice of Shrew I might have a hard time convincing anyone. How would you justify it? Or would you at all?

I came across a review of a show that was very intriguing to me. It’s called Choose Your Own Shakespeare.

Did you ever read those action series novels Choose Your Own Adventure when you were younger? Or maybe you still do. It’s sort of like that. The actors have many scenes and monologues in memory and ask the audience which way they want the story to go. It sounds really really cool.

The reviewer here, however, thought that the performance was lacking. Not energy or talent from the cast but in the structure of the show. He complains that much of the show seemed to be pre-planned already and that certain scenes and soliloquies came out of nowhere. Either way I’d really like to see something like this.

I think it’s a really good idea. Shakespeare wrote so much, scenes to cover the entire scope of multiple stories of people’s lives. Shakespeare’s writing can inform against all occasions. There are dozens of parallels between his plays and it wouldn’t necessarily be too difficult to pick multiple ways to transition to a scene in another play, if you have a very clever team putting together the show.

Productions such as this one can really point out the universality of Shakespeare’s works. How enormous the breadth of his canon is and how wide is his influence and even the versatility of his words. It’s awesome. Not awesome like a well played baseball game — full of awe. AWEsome.

Hamlet’s advice to the players is at an end, but your work is just beginning. I’d just like to wrap up the wealth of information covered in this speech.

There’s no end to the advice that can be given on acting Shakespeare, but everything you really need to know is in this text. The rest is just mastering it… which of course takes years and years.

Visit the speech every now and then. You may connect to certain parts better over time. Actually, I can almost guarantee that you will. You’ll see a performance either good or bad, come back to the speech and you’ll discover, “Oh, I see what that means!” or, “That’s why he sucked,” etc. You might even recognize things you’re doing in a performance. Maybe get in the habit of speaking this speech every time before you start a new production.

And now to sum up your actor’s checklist that Hamlet so eloquently spoke in this speech:

• Speak you lines fluently
• Don’t do odd, extraneous movements
• Find the emotional balance between too tame and too wild
• Be honest
• Don’t be “real,” Be believable.
• Don’t add your own lines
• Tell the story

That list is in my words, not Hamlets. I feel those are some of the most important points in the speech. If I were to pick one most important one, it would be the last one on that list. Because you must do all the rest in order to tell the story well.

You’re work is cut out for you. I’m still working on it and I’m plan to always do so. Play. Have fun, make discoveries. Use the wonderful words you are given and your performance will shine. So what are you waiting for?

Go make you ready.

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