Hamlet Week: Day Five

Welcome, once again, good readers to Hamlet Week. We're winding down the five film stretch with the most recent adaptation of Shakespeare's play, this time done with the BBC in conjunction with the Royal Shakespeare Company, featuring two rather well known actors in starring roles. How will it hold up against yesterday's Hamlet? Let's turn to...


Cap'n Howdy's Handy Hamlet Handbook:

Date of Release: 2009

Directed By: Gregory Doran (MacBeth)

Dramatis Personae: Hamlet (David Tennant), Claudius (Patrick Stewart), Gertrude (Penny Downie), Horatio (Peter De Jersey), Polonius (Oliver Ford Davies), Laertes (Edward Bennett), Ophelia (Mariah Gale)

Other Notable Cast Members: Patrick Stewart (Dune, Jeffrey) - Ghost.

Setting: Denmark, thereabouts present day.

Run time: 182 minutes

What's Missing: Much of the play is left intact for the first half. There are tiny lifts here and there, mostly a line or two missing from a soliloquy or a speech, and the only things I really caught were pieces regarding Old Norway and Fortinbras that were gone.

The big removals come after Hamlet kills Polonius and is sent back to England; it's as though Doran realized that this version was only three hours long and so he began desperately cutting material. To wit, everything after Hamlet leaves takes place in the last 40 minutes or so (including Ophelia's madness, drowning, the return of Laertes, Hamlet meeting Fortinbras' soldier, his return, the burial scene, the introduction of Osric, and the duel). Comparatively speaking, in Branagh's version, all of this happens in the last 87 minutes, so there are deletions a-plenty.

Half of Claudius' conversation regarding Hamlet and revenge is gone; the scene now begins with him asking Laertes "was your father dear to you" followed quickly by "Hamlet comes back" and then the hatching of the plan. There is no mention of how Hamlet returned, what the letter addressed to Claudius says, or how he found Horatio. Only a cursory mention is given to "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead," which is given to Horatio to deliver rather than Hamlet recounting their treachery.

The gravedigger scene is much shorter, as is the duel (which begins with ten minutes left in the run time), and despite the fact that much ado had been made of Fortinbras (very little concerning Fortinbras has been cut, even compared to Branagh's complete version), his invasion of Elsinore is wholly deleted from the 2009 version.

Other Deviations: I suppose the biggest change has to be the fact that Patrick Stewart plays both Claudius and the Ghost of Hamlet. For reasons I'll get to below, there are some interesting ramifications that come from the implication that they were twin brothers (which are at times addressed and at times maddeningly ignored), and what it means to the mental state of Hamlet.

The setting doesn't upset this Hamlet as much as it did the 2000 version; while there are similarities (the use of Close Circuit TVs, Hamlet's fascination with filming things, the abbreviated use of guns, and the method by which Hamlet kills Polonius - almost identical), the production does not feel locked into 2009 (it may be unfair to call this a "film" version, since though it was shot on film, it was broadcast on the BBC and released on DVD and Blu-Ray in the U.S.). The Royal Court of Denmark is very reminiscent of the public way royal families are portrayed: signing treaties, making appearances at formal occasions, and publicly devoted to the interests of state. If anything, the 2009 version of Hamlet feels more "updated" to reflect the way heads of state behave than to "modernize" it for Generation Y.

There are other things, mostly character beats, that I'll split up between here and the ensuing sections. For example, rather than run away during The Mouse-trap (as every other Claudius does), Patrick Stewart picks up a lantern and walks directly to where Hamlet is sitting (and filming - ostensibly the play, but it's clear from the cutaways to 16mm footage that he's filming Claudius and Gertrude) and looks at him directly, almost to say "you are responsible for this." Their relationship is considerably different from other interpretations of Hamlet.

Ophelia is also treated differently early in the play. Her conversation with Laertes, which is often played as the wiser brother lecturing his sister, is instead a back and forth between siblings that know each other all too well (for example, when she says "Do not, as some ungracious pastors do, Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven; Whiles, like a puff'd and reckless libertine, Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads, And recks not his own rede," she draws attention to the condoms in Laertes' luggage). It was also interesting to note that in this take on Hamlet, only Polonius seems to spend much time with the Royals, as Gertrude clearly doesn't know who Ophelia is when she enters the throne room.

What Works: There's quite a bit to like about Doran's 2009 adaptation of Hamlet, and as mentioned above, much of it comes from character choices by the actors. David Tennant, for example, brings a manic energy to Hamlet that is reminiscent (but never copying) of his time on Doctor Who. What he does to make it different is that he channels it in such a way that viewers are never certain just how together Hamlet is. Yes, he claims there's method in his madness, but Tennant's Hamlet is just slightly unhinged and it's entirely fair to suggest that he may not be thinking clearly from the earliest moments. (This is incidental, perhaps, but for much of the first half of the play, Hamlet is barefoot - even while wearing a tuxedo.)

Hamlet seems genuinely terrified of Ophelia during the "nunnery" scene, as though his love for her and his obsession with revenge were two feelings that could not be reconciled. Rather than gently try to warn her to leave (as is the case in the Olivier, Zeffirelli, and - arguably - Branagh versions), Hamlet lashes out and runs away in a panic. Later, during The Mousetrap, Tennant gives a reading of "did you think I meant country manners" that emphasizes the first half of the word country; a reading I've yet to hear in any version of Hamlet to this point. (I had to rewind the disc to make sure I heard what I thought I heard.)

Tennant also emphasizes the word "Madam" in "I shall in all my best obey you, madam," which is also the first time I've heard a take on Hamlet that made it abundantly clear he was staying only because of Gertrude, and that Claudius' "Why, 'tis a loving and a fair reply" was a hollow victory for the new King.

Speaking of Claudius, Patrick Stewart does some very interesting work with the unjustly crowned King of Denmark. In other versions, it's never exactly clear how Claudius feels about Hamlet; in some, he appears to behave kindly towards him for Gertrude's sake; in others, like Branagh's, Claudius appears to genuinely want things to work out between the three of them, until Hamlet's behavior pushes him beyond a reasonable point. Stewart's Claudius loves Gertrude, but it's clear from their first scene together that he does not like Hamlet as a person. Claudius is aloof towards Hamlet, unsure whether he really wants to indulge the Prince's mood swings, and when Stewart begins to speak to Hamlet, only to turn away and direct his attention to Laertes, the snub is deliberate.

Even when praying, it seems as though Claudius feels some guilt but can't bring himself to actually atone for it. When, realizing that prayer will have no effect, Claudius rises, he indifferently walks away, neither frustrated nor disappointed that his efforts are in vain. As the Ghost of Hamlet, Stewart strips away the reserve of Claudius and is a bellowing, angry spirit. He shouts in a way that is neither frightening nor pathetic (as other versions do), but of a King commanding vengeance from his unstable son - who may well be imagining this.

There's a nice touch involving the CCTV's switching from the "regular" camera which indicates that while Horatio, Bernardo, and Marcellus can see the Ghost, the surveillance camera cannot. Just as Hamlet bends his "eye on vacancy" in Gertrude's chamber, so too do the guards in the opening scene. The CCTV camera is also the bane of Hamlet's existence in the throne room, as it clues him in that Polonius and Claudius are spying on Ophelia (even though they stand behind a two way mirror, reminiscent of the Branagh version).

Finally, I was quite fond of Oliver Ford Davies Polonius, because he finds a kind of balance between the doddering old fool from Olivier's version and the crafty, if over-clever Ian Holm Polonius in Zeffirelli's. Polonius in Doran's version is wise counsel to Claudius (and to the throne), but he has a nasty habit of letting his mind wander, which Davies portrays less comically and more frustrating to those around him. At first, it's not clear where he's taking the audience, until Doran allows Polonius to address the camera directly during the "fishmonger" scene, at which point every aside from Polonius is delivered to the audience exclusively. It's a clever touch, and makes for a logical bridge when Hamlet does so during the "play's the thing" speech shortly after.

What Doesn't Work: There are a few things that keep this from being my favorite version of Hamlet, and I doubt that repeated viewings will soften them much. One is the seemingly pointless inclusion of Fortinbras, particularly if his story is building in the background to no end. The reason that Fortinbras is so frequently excised from film versions of Hamlet is that the ending of the play does not suffer radically with his absence. To those more caught up in the main story, the appearance of Fortinbras (and, to some extent, the English Ambassador) comes as a needless introduction of a new character at the very end of the story.

However, as I mentioned on the very first day of Hamlet Week, he serves a great purpose as counterpoint to Hamlet's story, so if you're going to include the Fortinbras subplot all the way through the play, there's no reason to leave out his arrival, especially if you go about the effort to reinstate Laertes leading a mob into Castle Elsinore under the guise of revolution. Thematically, you've set the audience up for a story counterpoint they'll never get.

As I mentioned above, the Claudius / King Hamlet juxtaposition is never adequately explored. Yes, there's plenty of opportunity to surmise and space for conjecture on the audiences' part about Hamlet's sanity, but in a critical scene like the one in Gertrude's bedroom, Doran holds back. There would be some irony to Hamlet's speech about how different the two photos of Kings were - if we had a better look at them. But we don't, only brief glimpses of two Danish newspapers played without insert shots of Claudius and King Hamlet. Imagine if the scene had played out as it does, but with Hamlet's insistence that the two were not alike as we, the audience, could see Patrick Stewart in both pictures?

There are also a handful of similarities to Almereyda's Hamlet that perhaps could be overlooked outside of the proximity of viewing. Polonius hides behind a glass mirror while spying on Hamlet and Gertrude, and when he calls out, Hamlet pulls a gun out of Gertrude's drawer and shoots the mirror, in a manner far too much like the 2000 adaptation. It doesn't help that this is the first time a handgun appears in this Hamlet, thus reminding me of the disastrous effect it had in Almereyda's film. The subsequent motif of broken mirrors in Doran's Hamlet makes some headway into erasing that connection, but the damage was done already, raising sour memories for the Cap'n.

Oh, and this is spoiler-ish, but the death of Claudius has a laughable quality to it, partly because of the decisions that Stewart brings to the character. When Hamlet, at swordpoint, hands Claudius the poisoned cup (instead of forcing him to drink it like almost every other version), the villain takes the cup, looks at it, and does this:


It's harder to convey in a photo than seeing it move, but Stewart just shrugs and drinks the poisoned wine. He shrugs, as to say "Oh, fuck it, I'll off myself," and then does! I had a hard time not laughing as he pounded the goblet and fell over dead, which is absolutely not what I thought would happen with Patrick Stewart's Claudius.

My last quibble is a minor one, which is why I saved it for last. Perhaps because of budget, or perhaps because it resembled the actual set used for the stage production, the first two-thirds of 2009's Hamlet takes place on two sets: the hallway outside Elsinore and - primarily - inside the throne room. It's redressed to look like Gertrude's room, or a greeting room, or a place to stage The Mouse-Trap, but is too clearly the same great hallway used over and over again. When the characters finally move out of that hallway (and into, say, a stairwell, basement, or outdoors for the grave scene), it's clear that perhaps it could have varied a bit more, and thus renders Doran's version to something like a filmed version of a stage production. Again, since the camerawork is well executed most of the time, it's largely forgivable, but I couldn't shake the feeling this was less "cinematic" than it could have been.

Well, okay. There's one more. The Osric was a little hard to take any heed to, in part because of how much he looked like a British Jack McBrayer:


Final Thoughts: I doth protest too much, methinks. Most of my problems with this Hamlet come from comparing to longer (and shorter) interpretations to the material, and many of the choices made as characters were concerned were fresh and interesting. It's easily my second favorite version of Hamlet, and were the second half as riveting as the first, it would be a harder decision to make. As it is, I heartily recommend you check it out, as you aren't likely to have the excessive frame of reference I do, considering the week that's passed.


Stay tuned tomorrow for a special bonus review!