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A triumph in Elsinore
Hamlet
Stage2,
Crescent Theatre, Birmingham
*****
I HADN'T seen
Stage2 perform before this production, to my shame, though I knew a
little of its reputation.
I know that it has now
reached its 27th
year; that its current director, Liz Light, was one of the key founders;
that it recruits young performers from seven to 21; performs plays of
all kinds, from Swallows and Amazons
to Shakespeare; that its activity never
ceases, with workshops and imaginative training sessions throughout the
year; that it will be touring to Italy this summer (presenting Steve
Berkoff’s Requiem for Ground Zero);
that it trains all its young performers in the art of backstage work and
other technical skills; and that it is not afraid to make demands on its
young performers.
But I wasn’t quite
ready for the quality I encountered.
Hamlet is one of the toughest things in
the entire repertoire for anyone to tackle – let alone a youth company,
even one as good as this.
The truth is, I found this superlative production
difficult to fault. First, Liz Light’s direction, which seemed to
overlook nothing: every move, every block, every gesture meticulously
plotted.
Secondly, the striking lighting, much of it from
above, so as to preserve a degree of gloom while picking out characters
eerily, operated by James Fenton; when the light suddenly blazed from
front of house for the players’ entry, the effect was electrifying.
Thirdly, the impact of the set – an imposing rear
stairway leading up to two artfully contrasted thrones for Claudius and
Gertrude, a regal pink contrasted with grey, and an alcove on either
side used to considerable effect. Fourthly, the gloriously chosen
costumes.
This Hamlet looked good, felt good, was
good.
CONVINCING PERFORMERS
Another success is the way the company tweaked
the text to allow for additions and changes. Thus two of the most
convincing performers, the snakelike Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, were
played by girls, ostensibly conniving daughters of Claudius (Rosie
Nisbet, Roni Mevorach); they added strength each time they appeared.
Likewise the two small servants, hands behind backs, deferential,
observant – Dillan McKeever, a terrific, well-spoken young performer,
and Toma Hoffman equally articulate as Claudius’ attentive page.
Much depends on the leads. George Hannigan
 as
Claudius gave an object lesson in the delivery of his lines: both he and
Tom Baker’s Polonius, another whose speechifying placed him in the top
bracket, looked slightly awkward movers, yet they shone in every line
they spoke, and while Baker caught the fussiness of Polonius, Hannigan
offered a Claudius who was every bit the villain, one who recruited
others to do his dirty work. Claudius rarely leaves the stairs; he seems
to look on them as his security.
Liz Light uses the space available to great
effect. From the start, the soldiery (Luca Hoffman, Bradley Layton, Jack
Deakin, all quite characterful) and Horatio (Peter Collier’s diction a
bit suspect, but then he improved vastly later when heard closer to)
encounter the Ghost (Alex Butler) in the gallery that runs beside and
above the audience. The spatial divide works perfectly. The rearstage
side alcoves, earlier for Polonius and later for the Gertrude bedchamber
scene, look good and are well lit. Hamlet’s knifing of Polonius looked a
little abrupt, yet we make allowances for such make-believe because we
are totally with the production.
One of the best things in this play is the
chorus, the direction of which was so inventive and well thought out it
looked as if they’d all received precise instructions. You could see it
in the first court scene, where their blocking and positioning looked
impeccable, and the way they clear the stage too, incredibly neatly but
swiftly, was just perfect. They impressed with their precision and their
stance and gestures every time any of them entered. It is part of
Stage2’s plan to make use, where possible, of a large support cast. Here
it worked a dream.
Because of their command of detail, their
intimate conversations and stylish interaction, the chorus always made
its mark. None of it looked actorese, or simply put on and feebly
invented on the spot. This was one of the jauntiest, most believable
stage-filling choruses I have ever seen. The acting was consistently
first-class.
One of the thrills of this production are the
Players. Partly the gripping enaction of the provocative play, The
Murder of Gonzago, which sends Hannigan’s Claudius into apoplexy, as
their actual arrival. Fenton’s lights, so subdued and deliberately
demure for much of this Hamlet, suddenly come on full blaze.
From the back of the audience an astonishing
array of clownish personnel descend to turn the stage into a feast of
colour: multi-hued ribbons and beautifully designed costuming seize the
stage and fill the scene with capering and humour and, again, many
little details of impudent frivolity. The whole atmosphere lifts. It’s a
wild harlequinade on a huge, explosive scale.
Leading the fray are Andrew Brown’s Player King,
his movement full of strange jerks and quirks, but clearly the leader;
and Ethan Tarr’s somewhat wild and scatty Player Queen, more dotty and
impulsive than camp. Some of the smaller, minor multi-coloured
characters who interact with these like Puck and his fairies add a lot,
above all because they are meticulously drilled. The two girls who
declaimed from the balcony were quite brilliant.
BEAUTIFULLY POISED
A comparably delicious scene is the Gravediggers:
Aidan Richards is surrounded by a neat little huddle of chorus
characters, and indulges in a positive feast of crazy chicanery, very
funny, beautifully poised, and all splendidly bringing out the irony
introduced by Hamlet’s entry and recognition of Yorick’s skull. Richards
generated a hilarious one-man show, played out with accomplices. Every
move seemed tightly worked out, the scene cleverly blocked. It perfectly
exemplified the deftness and stylishness of Stage2’s preparatory work.
There are of course the women, each trapped in
their way. Priya Edwards established herself early on in Gertrude’s
pleading; a slightly frail, put-upon delicate queen; her green velvet
attire is typical of the quality of costuming in this show: endless
variety for members of the chorus, the servants, the soldiers, the
principals: a lot of black, but also maroon, beige, gold braid (for
Claudius) and more greens. There is a superb consistency in these
costumes: not one of them looked out of place or second best. One sensed
a court that was indeed rich and comfortable. But this Gertrude always
looked vulnerable.
Laura Dowsett plays Ophelia, and she – pregnant
at the outset, as we see from a small opening vignette – produces a
tender, by no means weedy, at times wilful figure. She interacts well in
a scene with Dan Nash’s confident, slightly overbearing Laertes, whose
return scene with the chorus is one of the best, just as his plotting
with Claudius is vividly done. Once or twice facing upstage we lose
Ophelia’s words; but when she speaks more expressively, and from front
stage, she is beautifully clear as well. It is in the mad scene that she
scores wonderfully; utterly believable, unerringly tragic.
The character we have not mentioned so far is, of
course, Hamlet. The casting in this show is incredibly successful, but
the triumph is awarding Mark James the part of Hamlet. Scene after scene
is lifted by his presence and authority. Early on there is his interplay
with Polonius – part serious, part mocking.
There is the scene with Rosencrantz and
Guildenstern in which the humour and double entendres come close to the
buffoonish exchanges of the Fool and Lear. But it is the soliloquies –
‘frailty thy name is woman’, ‘to put an antic disposition on’, ‘my
thoughts be bloody or be nothing worth’ – where the extraordinary
variability and variety of James’s speaking becomes clear.
It is astonishingly sensitive. He can drop his
voice to next to nothing, or modulate his pitch and intensity, and
produce a whole kaleidoscope of different sounds and levels. The result
is that he’s always interesting to listen to: you cling on his every
word, every rasp, every whisper
If anything pulls all these top-level qualities
together, it is the final scene. The chorus is more alive than ever –
every member, small or large, is pouring him or herself into the
excitement of the fight. The actual swordplay between James (Hamlet) and
Nash (Laertes) is nailbiting: utterly professional, thanks to
chorographer Wayne Fitzsimons and his aide Rosie Nisbet. The processes
by which the woundings take place, the poison gets passed around and
revenge is wrought are violent, savage, poignant and genuinely lifelike.
The blocking of the doomed Laertes and Hamlet is a masterpiece. It’s
certainly one of the best Hamlet final scenes I have seen.
To 18-04-15
Roderic Dunnett
15-05-15
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