{"id":1467,"date":"2017-02-28T22:48:45","date_gmt":"2017-02-28T22:48:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/?p=1467"},"modified":"2017-02-28T22:48:45","modified_gmt":"2017-02-28T22:48:45","slug":"propwatch-the-watches-in-hamlet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/2017\/02\/propwatch-the-watches-in-hamlet.html","title":{"rendered":"Propwatch: the watches in Hamlet"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2018You\u2019re back again?\u2019 said the friend-of-a-friend usher at the Almeida when I arrived for Hamlet<\/a>.<\/em> She was mistaken. The insanely awaited production starring Andrew Scott<\/a> is so very sold-out that buying even one ticket felt like a triumph. And, at nigh-on four hours, I was sure once would be fine. Nah-uh: Scott\u2019s performance and Robert Icke\u2019s production are a blanket of revelation. I arrived dog-tired, I left emotional. I\u2019d love to go back.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s lots to say about the genius line-readings and surprising additions. But I just want to think about the watches for a bit. (Spoilerphobes, look away now.)<\/p>\n

What\u2019s in a watch? Traditionally, it\u2019s a landmark gift from father to son \u2013 and Hamlet<\/em>\u00a0is a tragedy of fathers (cherished, mourned, resented) and sons (disturbed, displaced). Early on, Icke draws your attention to the watches that yoke the generations together. As Laertes (Luke Thompson) heads off to France, his father Polonius (Peter Wight) gives him a flashy gold number, heavy with pride. Chunky, shiny affirmation for a golden boy. Laertes may have a temper and a neck tattoo, but he\u2019s groomed for office. Though, as Polonius, the inveterate master-spook, plans to send spies after his son, the watch is probably fitted with a tracking device.<\/p>\n

Hamlet\u2019s own watch is more homely. Classic, black-strapped, slightly worn yet worn with love. Scott touches it at the beginning of the play, as he thinks of his father \u2013 I\u2019m guessing it was his dad\u2019s, maybe even taken from the bedside table or unstrapped from the dead man\u2019s wrist. A token of everything that hadn\u2019t yet been said, perhaps. At any rate, it\u2019s a constant reminder of the prince\u2019s grieving present, freighted with the past and refusing to move into the new regime\u2019s brittle future.<\/p>\n

The time is out of joint, oh yes. So is Scott \u2018s Hamlet, supremely emotionally and intellectually engaged and perching on the brink of tears \u2013 it must be an exhausting performance to give. His voice, mostly\u00a0hushed in the intimate space, will suddenly hit the pedal and roar.<\/em> The present feels febrile and jittery, the past too\u00a0concrete \u2013 especially as this production develops an unusually heightened sense of the backstory of each relationship. Scott is wary with Juliet Stevenson\u2019s smothery warmth as Gertrude. Warier still with Angus Wright\u2019s basso wolf of a Claudius. Playful with Ophelia (Jessica Brown Findlay), and with an intriguing sense that he and Amaka Okafur\u2019s Guildenstern were once an item (no wonder things are tense with Rosencrantz). The past here is full, complicated, and a brake on moving on.<\/p>\n

Time stops here<\/strong><\/p>\n

Time is funny in this play. Hamlet is still a student, though at least 30 years old (and typically played by an older actor \u2013 Scott is 40). The play\u2019s main event has already happened \u2013 the murder of old Hamlet, which the action gradually validates. The first, long arc of the play (the first two acts in this production, lasting well over two hours) is a telescoped day or two, here backed by a rolling celebration for Claudius\u2019 marriage and coronation. With no windows in Hildegard Bechtler\u2019s set (the guards don\u2019t patrol battlements but monitor security cameras), it\u2019s hard to gauge night and day. The bleary knees-up (Gertrude and Claudius always with the slow dance) enhances the sense of a long, sore-eyed night, punctuated by headache cannonfire.<\/p>\n

Then everything hurtles forwards. The play-within-a-play and its traumatic aftermath. Hamlet arrested and bundled off to England. Another lurch forward in which Ophelia loses her wits and Hamlet returns. The final burst of everybody dies. A play about the heavy past and the impossible present suddenly agitates everyone into calamity.<\/p>\n

And then: spoiler spoiler spoiler. Remarkably, in the final moments of the evening, the watches return. Hamlet<\/em> typically ends with a pile-up of bodies, or any survivors lugging the corpses offstage. Not here. The translucent wall of Bechtler\u2019s set reveals the party scene of the first act \u2013 white balloons in a powdery glow \u2013 where the dead join Ophelia, Polonius and the other early arrivals. David Rintoul\u2019s old Hamlet is on the door, where each character unbuckles their watch and hands it over. Time stops here \u2013 but so too does obligation, the burden of duty, the great dead weight of having to keep on going. Minute by minute, day by day. No more.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the most beautiful image \u2013 personal, workaday, magical \u2013 for a play which, among many other things, shows its hero learning how to die. Time, and all it demands, keeps you sad, pulls you back \u2013 and at long last lets you free.<\/p>\n

Photo above: Andrew Scott and Amaka Okafor by Manuel Harlan.<\/em><\/p>\n

Follow David on Twitter – @mrdavidjays<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u2018You\u2019re back again?\u2019 said the friend-of-a-friend usher at the Almeida when I arrived for Hamlet. She was mistaken. The insanely awaited production starring Andrew Scott is so very sold-out that buying even one ticket felt like a triumph. And, at nigh-on four hours, I was sure once would be fine. Nah-uh: Scott\u2019s performance and Robert […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1468,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[194,90,322,321,175,32,34],"class_list":{"0":"post-1467","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uncategorized","8":"tag-almeida-theatre","9":"tag-hamlet","10":"tag-props","11":"tag-propwatch","12":"tag-robert-icke","13":"tag-shakespeare","14":"tag-theatre","15":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1467","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1467"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1467\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1471,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1467\/revisions\/1471"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1468"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1467"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1467"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1467"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}