Hamlet

by William Shakespeare, directed by Rick Barbour
Great River Shakespeare Festival Intern and Apprentice Acting Company (July 22, 2009)

The GRSF production of Hamlet provides a good reminder of what a great play Hamlet is. It’s also a good reminder of how well the entire GRSF company delivers Shakespeare’s texts. WSU’s black box theater exposes the actors on three sides of the stage—just feet away from the audience. There is little in the way of set pieces to hide behind, minimal lighting, minimal costuming, few props, and no exits. In fact, all the actors are on stage for the entire production. In this setting, the success of the play rests on the actors willingness to trust Shakespeare’s text and their ability to make Shakespeare’s language resonate.

Perhaps it is the language that is the strongest part of the apprentice production. Like all of the GRSF productions, these young actors are able to deliver Shakespeare’s lines with a precision and a cadence that is quite beautiful. Even during times when my mind may have wandered from the meaning of the words, I found myself enjoying the sound and the flow of the words—the company has achieved a certain musicality. And while it is easy to take the language for granted—it is Shakespeare after all, and these actors make it sound natural—the musicality must be the result of dedicated work with the text.

In an unusual choice, this production splits the role of Hamlet between four actors. While director Rick Barbour indicated that the decision to break up the role was largely a matter of sharing the work load and making sure that all the acting apprentices had significant roles to work on, the four-person Hamlet actually seemed quite natural. The four, JJ Gatesman, Kate Kremer, Dylan Roberts and Sarah Naughton, hold a certain unity in the role, even as each actor inevitably brings a unique personality to the person of Hamlet. I expected to be distracted by the changing, but like the rest of the play, it simply works, and different actors helped fill out the character. Hamlet is a very complicated and conflicted character—the different actors provided a subtle way to explore this complexity.

The acting in this production is strong from the major roles all the way down to minor characters. In the sixth year of the festival, Winona’s growing theater audience may take it for granted that all of the roles in a play will be played by very good actors. But this isn’t always the case in theater, and especially with Shakespeare’s plays, which tend to have large casts, most productions suffer a drop off in talent in the smaller roles. But because this cast is very talented, even the smaller characters maintain a high level of delivery. For example, Nicholas Munoz plays a powerful Fortinbras, worthy of a conquering general and future king of Denmark. Because Fortinbras’ entrance comes in the final scene of the play as most of the major characters lie dead on the stage, there often is not a powerful actor left to play him. (Munoz and nearly all of the other actors play two or more roles to cover the many and varied persons who appear on stage.)

In keeping with the black box nature of the play, the scenes are created by the actors on stage. Hamlet presents many challenges for settings, and the Intern and Apprentice company use simple and creative methods of meeting these challenges. From the night watch scenes to shipside and the graveyard, the company rises to the challenge of creating enough of an illusion of a space to move the story along. Much of this space and mood is established by on-stage vocalizations and simple instrumentation. This is particularly effective in the scenes where Hamlet’s ghost appears, but these types of sound effects are used effectively throughout the production. Additionally, Stephanie Lambourn’s musical adaptations and enacting of Ophelia’s “mad” songs are effectively disturbing and moving.

The Intern and Apprentice Acting Company’s production allows its audience to experience Hamlet in a way that really lets Hamlet shine. It is also a very good showcase of some young actors who are able to rise to the demands of one of the world’s great plays.

The GRSF Intern and Apprentice Acting Company’s production of Hamlet has three more performances:
Thursday, July 23, 3:00 p.m.
Friday, July 24, 7:30 p.m.
Saturday, July 25, 3:00 p.m.

Visit the Great River Shakespeare Festival for schedules and tickets: grsf.org