Throughout the relentless days of lockdown, theatre took the largest hit of any art form. They had to cut short their production tours, restrict their rehearsal spaces, had funding slashed and took longer than most other venues to open again physically. Until a constant stream of digital productions saved it (and still is saving it) from its death throes productions which are mostly just variations on screening a production: pointing a camera at a stage. It was nice but hurt. Nice to see theatre; sometimes live theatre, again. But then how “theatrical” can it be without the audience? One show that began steadily rebuilding them in July 2021 was Sean Mathias’ age-blind Hamlet, starring Sir Ian McKellen as the Prince.
The difference with this new cinematic re-imaging is realising that while we’ve had months of theatrical productions presenting the theatrical through a cinematic medium Mathias’ ‘restaging’ of this incarnation sees it now being told through the space of the stage as cinema. The method in filmmaking is to scour every nook and crack of Theatre Royal Windsor: box office, foyer, dressing rooms, toilets, even the streets outside when McKellen’s Hamlet wanders fractured and almost anxious about what’s going to happen.
The relationship between stage and screen often viewed as combative contraries has clearly found a suitable use for another in recent years (accelerated through COVID). National Theatre’s Live streaming/recording shows were nothing new but certainly left the artform in a lurch with spaces closed and everyone staring at four walls and screens, so why not tell stories using multi-camera captures of shows. But this is different.
There are ways Oseman’s cinematography almost perverts itself to re-frame the play where theatre cannot always achieve it. secret filming Claudius from Horatio’s perspective; bringing Hamlet into pivotal scenes by having him already in the theatre box; this is an Elsinore no one has seen before. The creative use of the space throughout Theatre Royal offers a playful, insightful use of the venue even for the most seasoned visitors. Mathias makes the theatre itself a star: turning toilet cubicles into holding cells and grand foyer as public domain where Hamlet mocks Polonius even more grounded by how everyday it seems while still capturing some stunningly well-orchestrated scenes on film with colour and effective lighting.
Continuing inflexions through his surprising but successful reprise of this incarnation, McKellen brings intimacy and eccentricities (for better or worse) from stage to screen. Words often remarked for having weight are delivered with off-the-cuff franknesses and instead this significance is moved to lesser-known speeches though still ripe with value and exploration, even for those most familiar. It’s a strikingly effective and uncanny move from Mathias and McKellen which works brilliantly well with how intensely close-up shots are used throughout the film; tucked away in every possible narrow corner of the theatre.
In terms of the physicality, the film is let down by an attention to detail and protracted sequences where Mathias’ direction does hold onto the long beats of the play. It’s helped, a little, by movement direction and decisions that try to inject more momentum (McKellen does a sporting job at throwing themselves into exerting impressive energy). But smarter choices of movement also apply to the performativity, which gradually moves closer to cinema’s ability to drive emotions with the canny move to offer a lens of truth that allows for terrifically insightful performances from Jonathan Hyde as a guilty Claudius who uses the camera as a mirror of sorts his conscience reflected in it.
Alis Wyn Davie’s Ophelia continues a strong cast, one which conducts itself with huge compassion and growing resistance and insight present; they are playing more to an audience off an invisible stage than screen, and it proves a brilliant foil for McKellen’s Hamlet. While Steven Barkoff’s military blustering Polonious absorbs every ounce of camera they can get from it, moments away from either winking or nudging its eye out. Though the standout role sometimes even overtaking McKellen’s headline act Emmanuella Cole’s Laertes gives us what feels like a performance that grips onto rhythmic nature of poet-bardic writing: touching and controlled all at once.
The inevitable ‘theatricalness’ of Hamlet is constantly under scrutiny here as Shakespeare’s most performative piece gets closer than ever before imagined with Mathia’s film-theatre beasts that are two forms yet become one. Featuring some of McKellen’s more nuanced and understated performances (with some fantastic fluffy jumpers and sublimely elaborate costumery work from Loren Elstein) in a role which seems to latch into a more personal commentary on even acceptance of age despite the film and play in attempting to refute them. It steadies the ship of an experimental film and shows the beauty and power of theatre and film without one eclipsing the other. Showing in cinemas for one night only – February 27th – Hamlet allows audiences to see there are still things to discover in heaven and earth, and how can industry synergise with itself, instead of compete?
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