The Wooster Group’s Hamlet @ The Public Theater

What is Shakespeare? Is it the name of an Elizabethan poet/playwright? A genre? A cultural institution? A field of academic study? Although, undoubtedly, Shakespeare was once a man, he is no longer. Shakespeare is something else now. And if any of his plays are something now other than what they once were, it is Hamlet. Ask some ordinary folks to show you some Shakespeare, and they will most likely begin performing the lines “To be or not to be” in some sort of British-ish accent, possibly delivered to a skull (should one be available). Is Hamlet this action? Or is Hamlet a person, a place, or a thing? Is Hamlet an idea?

Although, theatre historians will insist on the democratic nature of Shakespeare’s performances in Elizabethan England, he has been passed down to us as a cultural artifact because some rich and powerful people decided that his texts were important. Hence the high-class reek that seems to follow Shakespearean drama like a dead father’s ghost despite many noble efforts to the contrary. So many mid to late 20th century encounters with Shakespeare are prefaced by a denial of this elitist pedigree, an effort that often reinforces the notion even more deeply.

The 1964 Richard Burton Hamlet is an attempt at this re-discovery of the democratic origins of Shakespeare by taking the exclusive and privileged theatrical event, filming it and putting it out in movie theatres. The production itself is stripped down, in casual clothing, spoken out of the rhythm of the verse in a conversational way. It is a play for the common man, or rather, the uncommon man’s idea of him. This Hamlet is an honest attempt at recreating this perceived accessibility without the slightest hint of cynicism.

The Hamlet that we have inherited in the 21st Century has been filmed, set in other times and places, translated into American slang, deconstructed (and reconstructed), and interpreted in the service of various political and aesthetic motivations. To pretend that Shakespeare and Hamlet exist outside of their strange history (and the stranger history of the 20th century) is not only naive, but profoundly elitist. Bowing at the holy alter of timelessness divorces the text from any relevance it might have.

Theatre is a social art form that utilizes a shared a cultural language to create a community event. To negate the shared collective understanding a community brings to a memorialized text like Hamlet would only serve to alienate the audience.

However, despite the Wooster Group’s rejection of such traditional devices, this production was profoundly alienating as an audience member. By engaging with the media-saturated false freedoms of contemporary western culture so pointedly, the Wooster Group suspends the audience in a heightened awareness of their own ability to act in our society.

Whether or not it is possible to act honorably under deeply alienating circumstances is what Hamlet is ultimately about, even by the most traditional standards. For how unapologetically inter-textual this production strikes you at first glance, it has a strangely classical quality in the end.

http://publictheater.org/

http://www.thewoostergroup.org/