Lloyd Evans Lloyd Evans

Brooding Prince

Hamlet<br /> Wyndhams Arcadia<br /> Duke of York’s

issue 13 June 2009

Hamlet
Wyndhams

Arcadia
Duke of York’s

‘No one can do the definitive Hamlet. It’s too big for that. But you can do an enormous amount.’ Wise words. Jude Law’s as it happens. All Hamlets fail and it’s a great tribute that Law’s fails remarkably little. His stage presence is thrilling, intense and highly athletic, and he has no trouble capturing the pace and rhythm of the verse. What he misses is any hint of humour or warmth. There’s very little ordinary likeability about the Prince. Instead we get a brooding, frustrated outsider full of scorn and bile, and with a strain of impatient mockery that hints at priggishness and even cruelty. His treatment of Ophelia is coarse and violent. Long ago there was a tradition that Hamlet would re-enter after his ‘To a nunnery, go’ speech and kiss Ophelia’s hair.

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