On Tuesday evening, I travelled to Stratford, Ont, to see the opening night of Hamlet.  The tickets were comps from a friend of mine who works there.  I just checked their website, and those tickets would have cost $91.00, which is the main reason I don’t get to Stratford very often!  But if I had forked over that much money, I would have gotten my money’s worth.  It was awesome!

Even Toronto’s Globe and Mail loved the show and that’s really saying something.  This paper seems to feel that bad reviews sell more papers than good reviews, and consequently. They hate everything!

After the show, I described it as “deceptively spectacular”.  Deceptive, because when you first enter, the stage is a bare, black square with some woodwork up the back wall.  It appeared that this was going to be a stark and simply staged production…. Not a bad choice for staging Shakespeare, but probably a little irksome if you paid $91.00  :-).  And spectacular because, hidden in the woodwork, were two gigantic doors which would periodically burst inward to admit…. well…. Spectacle!  The first time they open, they admit a veritable avalanche of fog that buried the stage.  The fog quickly settles into that really cool dry-ice fog, that blankets the stage and spills over the edges.  The actors appear to be walking on a cloud!  Another time, they open for the incredible entrance of The Players, in a big truck tricked out like a snake oil salesman’s caravan with a stage on the back.  At least two or three times, I found myself saying “WOW!” out loud, and my friend beside me saying “yeah, no kidding!”

Those giant doors were a terrific device.  They allowed the stage to be bare and stark for those incredible soliloquies at one moment and, in the blink of an eye, transformed into a lunatic carnival the next.  The first act is an enormous two hours long, but, believe me, the time flew by.

Hamlet was directed by Adrian Noble.  Noble is a former artistic director of England’s Royal Shakespeare Company and is arguably one of the best Shakespearean directors in the world.  And it shows!  One of the hardest things to learn as a director is how to get out of the actor’s way, and Noble is a master at this.

It is hard to imagine a better Hamlet than Ben Carlson.  This is his second time playing Hamlet. To quote the Globe “he comes trailing acclaim from Chicago, where he won the 2007 Joseph Jefferson Award for best actor in the role”.  Imagine the prestigious Chicago Shakespeare Company casting a Canadian actor as Hamlet…. he’s that good!

I had a few problems with the show, but they were minor ones.  Generally I was blown away.

Hamlet plays till October, so if you are in the mood for a road trip this summer…. For some of you a very looong road trip…. You won’t be sorry you came.  Hey, let me know if you decide to come.  Maybe I can score you some free tickets :-)