HAMLET
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Although this is clearly a “concept” production (director Myron Freedman has done some major tinkering with the script), I can’t say I know what Freedman had in mind. Judging from his director’s notes, it seems he believes Hamlet is a semiautobiographical work. The bizarre rearrangement of the text must be tied to this notion, but it confused rather than clarified. And if Hamlet is indeed meant to be Shakespeare, Freedman has some mighty odd ideas about the playwright’s life, for his Hamlet comes off as nothing more than the fever dream of a sex-crazed lunatic.
The production begins with the faint sounds of the final duel between Hamlet and Laertes. The lights come up slowly on Hamlet, who’s lying on the ground. A ball bounces past him, and a young boy chases it, then runs off after seeing the inert prince. As the act unfolds, seemingly random, overlapping scenes play around Hamlet, until he sits up with a start. He watches the scenes in a daze, without comprehension, as though he’s a ghost in wonderland. Sometimes he reaches out to someone or touches them, but they don’t sense his presence.
Some of the ideas and images are interesting enough on a theoretical level. But the production is so sloppy and incoherent that they completely obscure the story line. Virginia Heaven’s gaudy, cartoonish costumes don’t help. Ophelia’s mad scene, for instance, is only made buffoonish by the slit and shredded dress she wears, which makes her look as if she’s auditioning for West Side Story.
